“Does that make you any different from Orbea?’’
“The difference, my friend, is that Orbea forgot what he started out to do.”
“And you’ll remember?”
“I’ll try to,” Santana said levelly.
Six continued eating, aware of the cocked gun in Vargas’ fist. He watched Santana, Vargas, and the movements outside, visible through the doorway, with consuming interest: he acted unconcerned, giving no indication whether or not he was worried by the prospect of captivity.
Two unpleasant-looking men appeared just outside the door; Vargas moved that way and argued with them in taut low tones. All the while, Vargas kept his gun—and his eyes—on Six. Santana moved toward the hut door to find out what was going on, and Vargas said disgustedly, “These are your loyal patriots – they demand immediate payment for the food they have delivered.”
Six, watching with half his attention, was thinking fast, eating almost bovinely to cover the workings of his mind. He had not come here without a plan, even if it looked as if he had; was this the time to spring it – and would it work? He was still deciding; meanwhile the colloquy went on near the door: Santana asked,
“How many pack animals have they brought?”
“Sixteen,” said Vargas.
“Pay them, then.”
“Por Diós - with what?”
“The coffer, Vargas.”
Vargas began to turn, then stopped. “And him?” He was pointing, with a gun, at Six.
Santana looked over his shoulder. “Send someone in to guard him while he eats.”
Vargas lifted his bellowing voice and sent it hurtling out across the camp. Presently an armed youth arrived; Vargas spoke quickly, the youth nodded and held his rifle on Six, and Vargas left.
Six, his eyes hooded, finished his meal and set the plate down on Santana’s table. Just then Vargas came back with canvas pokes, which he dropped into the hands of the two sour-faced traders, one of whom licked his lips and grinned at his partner: “And where shall we deliver the next load?”
“There will be no next load,” Vargas said. “You will stay here.”
“What!” But when the two men looked at Santana, Santana only nodded.
The trader drew himself up. “Santana, I will have you know—”
“You were led here,” Santana said. “You know my location now.”
“But you can rely on our honor “
“Of course,” Santana murmured, with distaste. “You will remain as our guests until we depart this place.”
Vargas took the two men roughly by their shoulders. “Come on, jackals. You’ll have time to count your gold … grain by grain.” He led the two of them, protesting, into the sheds below.
Six could see most of the scene through the doorway. He saw them go into the shed, heard a man cry out inside the place and heard boots crush the earth, scrambling into a run. One of the traders came running out of the shed, wide-eyed and open-jawed. A gun inside the shed went off, making a great round boom. The running man fell flat on his face in the dust. Vargas appeared in the shed mouth, stooped, a revolver in either hand.
Santana went down the slope and bent over the prone trader. From where Six stood, inside Santana’s hut, it had been evident by the way the man fell that he was dead.
Vargas dragged the second trader out of the shed. That one was dead too – knifed in the chest. Vargas had the two heavy sacks of gold dust in one fist.
Carlos Santana spun toward the giant and grabbed a handful of Vargas’ shirt-front. Vargas met his blazing glance unblinkingly. His voice was loud with justification; Six heard him say self-righteously, “They fought with me. It is his own knife – you can see that. I turned it against him and then the other one was running away. I had to stop him.”
Santana released him and pushed him away, and came back toward the hut, saying, “We are no better than our enemies, Vargas.”
“What?”
“Bury them.”
“Yes. And I’ll put the gold back where it came from – where it belongs.”
Santana came as far as the doorway of the hut, and turned and spoke to the crowd that had begun to gather: “If I thought any of you would kill two men for the sake of a few ounces of gold—”
Leaving the sentence hang, he curled inside the door. Outside, Vargas stood by the dead men and called petulantly after him:
“They were jackals, Santana – greedy worthless scum.”
Santana murmured, “And aren’t we all?” He shook his head. “These are tragic times.” He looked up, at Six, as if suddenly realizing that Six was still here. And Six, who had seen more than enough, thought, Time to quit being a spectator. It was time to start the action he had come for. He had arrived knowing the risks he faced; he was prepared. It was a small piece of luck that they had not thought to tie his hands again when he finished eating - but even that was not vital; he was prepared for that, too - a folded razor, carefully sewn to the inside of his belt, at the back where he could reach it and where no one was likely to look for it. As it turned out, he would not need it, at least for a while.
Vargas had his gun, but that too was not important; he had come fully expecting to be disarmed. Now, watching Santana and the confused armed youth by the door, Six thought, I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.
Moving slowly, so as not to startle the youth, Six put his boot up against the edge of the table and made as if to tug it straight on his foot. When he dropped his foot to the ground he turned, his face expressionless, to step forward. The movement momentarily placed Santana between Six and the young man with the rifle.
In that moment Six lifted his hand, displaying the twin-barreled derringer pistol he had lifted from his boot, and said very softly to Santana, “All right, now, don’t move a whisker.’’
Ten
“Tell the kid to drop his gun,” Six said. “Tell him to do it easy and not raise a ruckus.”
Santana watched him dismally. Not moving, not taking his eyes off Six, he said to the youth, “Do as he says, please.”
With reluctant rage the youth put the rifle down against the wall and stepped away from it.
Six said, “Now call Vargas in here.”
“Vargas?”
Six nodded and gestured with the derringer. It was taut and full of danger, this stretching moment – no telling when someone might barge into the hut, or when the youth might take a notion to make a try for Six. The derringer wouldn’t do him much good in a real fight. But he hoped Santana wouldn’t allow that to happen; Santana had to have a good enough sense of relative risks and values. Six had to count on the fact that Santana wouldn’t risk lives—his own or others—for Six. Six wasn’t that important to him. Or at least he hoped so.
Santana filled his chest, watched Six, and let his call sing out:
“Vargas!”
Six moved closer, reached out and extracted the Remington service revolver from Santana’s sash. With that in his left hand, he put the little derringer away in his pocket, cocked the Remington, and moved swiftly across the room to stand by the front wall, next to the youth’s rifle. The youth, unarmed now, backed up, going deeper into the room to join Santana.
Vargas’ giant shadow darkened the doorway. “You want me?”
“Come in here,” Six said, and shot a sharp glance at Santana.
Santana had no expression at all on his face. Vargas came slowly inside, blinking to accustom his eyes to the relative dimness inside the hut. He hadn’t yet seen the Remington in Six’s fist.
Six said, “Stand still, Vargas, and don’t make any sudden motions.”
Vargas stood bolt still, rearing back to look around at him. Six gave him time to see the gun, time to get used to the idea; then he said, “Now unbuckle your gunbelts and let them drop to the floor, and step over there with Santana.”
Vargas’ thick brows beetled down. Santana said quickly, “Do as he asks, Vargas.”
“But—”
“He does not intend us
harm,” Santana said. “Don’t risk your life without need.”
“Smart,” Six murmured. He waited until Vargas had dropped the gunbelts and stepped angrily back; then he went to them, picked them up, and recovered his own revolver, which had fallen along with Vargas’ belts. Six took the gunbelts back to the wall and dumped them beside the youth’s abandoned rifle.
He now had his own revolver in one hand, Santana’s in the other-formidable enough firepower, he hoped, to discourage even Vargas.
Santana said, in an almost conversational voice, “All right – what do you think this will get you?”
“Only what I came for.”
“Lament?”
“That’s it,” Six said. “Now I want you to come over to the door, nice and easy, and call him up here the way you called Vargas.”
“Suppose he’s not in earshot.”
“Then send someone for him,” Six said. “Just remember, I’m right here behind you with these guns. Don’t make any sudden remarks. You don’t want to risk your whole revolution for a couple of two-bit gringos who’ll be gone and forgotten within a few hours.”
“You really expect to get away from here with him?”
“One thing at a time,” Six said. “First call him.” And gestured gently with the revolver in his right hand.
Evidently Steve Lament had not been far away. He appeared very shortly after Santana called his name from the doorway.
He came in obviously primed – hand hooked over one gun butt. He saw me arrive, Six thought. But he didn’t give Lament any chance at all. When Lament stepped into the room Six, standing right by the doorway on the inside, jammed one gun hard against Lament’s back and said, “Not a whisker, Steve.”
“Jeremy?”
“That’s right.” Six’s voice was cold.
Lament hadn’t turned, not even his head. Now his shoulders slumped. “All right,” he said. “Go ahead. Pull the trigger.”
“I guess not.”
“Isn’t that what you came for?”
“I came to take you back.”
“Waste of time,” Lament said woodenly. “I’d just as soon have you get it over with now.”
“So would I, I guess, but the book isn’t written that way.”
“You do everything by the book, Jeremy?”
“By the book. Yes – everything in the book was put there for a reason. Drop your hardware, now.”
Lament let his gunbelt fall and moved farther into the room, toward Santana and Vargas and the youth. When Lament turned, it was the first Six had seen of his face. He had expected to feel a livid sense of hate. All he felt was a cool indifference, shaded by a slight surprise: Steve Lament looked gaunt, hollow and old. He had aged terribly since Six had last seen him.
This next part, Six thought, would be tricky.
Seeming to sense the same thought, Carlos Santana said, “All right – you’ve got us. Now what do you do with us?”
“Nothing – with you. Lament goes with me. So does Vargas.”
“Vargas?”
Vargas himself roared something and scowled.
“As a hostage,” Six said. “I’ll let him loose when I’m in the clear.”
Santana said, “And when will that be?”
“When I’m at the border,” Six told him, and met his eyes. “Vargas will help us keep out of the way of the Governor’s troops, because if he doesn’t, he’ll fall into their hands himself. And if any of your people come too close while we’re on our way, I’ll have to start putting bullets in him. In the knee, maybe, or the hand for a start.”
“You know my people’s methods, I see,” Santana muttered. “The question is, are you willing to use them?”
“You can try me,” Six said coolly. “I don’t imagine you will. Vargas is pretty important to you – you’ll be wanting him back in one piece.”
It was, right now, the riskiest part, and he saw he was going to make it: he saw Santana was going to let him do it. Santana could have stopped him, with one shout - at the risk of his life and the others’, taking a chance Six would not shoot them unarmed. But Santana would make no decision; no matter how much of an idealist he appeared, Santana was nevertheless aware of the brutalities of his own world. Had the positions been reversed, Santana—in the end—would have shot his unarmed hostages if it seemed necessary. Being that kind of man himself, Santana could not do otherwise than attribute the same style of thinking to Six.
And so, in this challenge of wills, Six was the winner – perhaps only because he had planned it, prepared for it, while it had taken Santana by surprise.
Six, who had been speaking in Spanish like the rest of them, spoke now in English to Santana: he said, “I want you to talk to the kid, there. Tell him to bring up four fresh horses, saddled and ready to go, and post them right outside the door here.”
“Four?”
Six said, “No questions, Santana. Four horses. Tethered right outside. He’s to talk to no one at all. I want you to tell him that – impress it on him. I want it to come from you, which is why I’m not telling him myself. Tell him that if he so much as says one word about what’s going on in here, it will cost you and Vargas your lives.”
“Would it really?”
“It could,” Six said flatly, “if you force me into that kind of corner. Don’t take the chance, Santana. Use your head.”
Santana turned and began to speak to the youth. Six watched all of them, particularly Vargas and Steve Lament. They all looked at him; none of them moved. Santana spoke at some length, impressing on the youth the importance of silence, the risk to his leaders’ lives should he blurt out what was happening inside this hut. Presently the youth, subdued and pale, slipped outside.
Six, with both guns cocked, leaned back against the wall. “Now let’s all just stand still. We’ve got a little wait to get through.”
Six came out the door first and stood just beside it while the others filed out. They all wore their guns – all unloaded, except Six’s. Six stood at the edge of the door so that he could watch Lament and Vargas mount up while at the same time he could see inside the hut, where Santana and the youth sat in the far corner, tied hand and foot, gagged with bandannas. Vargas had tied them, under Six’s supervision, but Six had tested the knots with care.
Now he stepped away from the doorway, picked up the reins of one of the horses and gathered them to the saddlehorn as he stepped smoothly into the saddle. His right hand rested on the holstered gun butt; he said sotto voce, “Pick up your reins now and move out ahead of me, nice and slow.”
Steve Lament said, “This is a hell of a waste of time, Jeremy.”
“Gentle down and keep quiet,” Six said.
There were, easily, more than a thousand people in view, scattered through the length of the crowded camp below. Six had no intention of riding a gamut through the entire camp. He said, “Turn left up into the trees.”
Vargas gave him a cold glance and reined his horse that way. Six had the reins of the fourth horse, saddled but riderless, draped over his left wrist. Leading the horse, he kept his right hand free on his holstered six-gun. Lament and Vargas rode just ahead of him, slowly singlefooting toward the handful of sheds and cabins that marked the upper perimeter of the camp. It was from one of those cabins that Six had seen the girl emerge, earlier when he had entered the camp; now he told his prisoners to head toward that cabin. As they moved up the steep pine-needle-strewn slope, Six spared a brief glance downward at the sprawl of the rebel camp. There was a great deal of busy activity. He had the feeling - he had felt the same way on arriving – that this was no longer merely a training camp for a someday revolution; he had the feeling Santana had them just about ready to go to war. Full-scale war against the Orbea administration. Another few days, he felt, and he would have had to ride onto a blazing battlefield to find Steve Lament.
…They reached the cabin in the pines and Six told them to halt their horses. Lament obeyed, incurious; he seemed wooden about everything. Bu
t Vargas gave Six a bright, alert frown of suspicion.
Six spoke to him rapidly. “Call the lady out here, Vargas.”
“I don’t—”
Six lifted his gun half out of holster. “You want me to go in there after her with this?”
Vargas flushed. He folded both big paws across his saddle horn and spoke in his thundering growl: “Elena?”
The girl’s voice came from within: “Who is it?”
“It is I, Vargas. Can you come outside a moment?”
“Of course. Who is that with—”
She had pulled the door open and stepped fully into daylight before she saw the revolver in Six’s fist. Six said mildly, “Please try not to be alarmed, Señorita Nijar. I want you to get on this horse and go for a bit of a ride with us.”
Her eyes were wide. “I … I don’t understand.”
“I’ll explain on the way. Please?” He held out the reins of the horse he was leading. Vargas moved forward to help her into the saddle; Vargas said:
“We must do as the gringo asks, for the moment, Elena.”
“But I still don’t—”
“Later,” Six said, feeling pressures of nervous urgency; he was strung taut as a telegraph wire. The past half hour had been endless, an almost intolerable tension; all the way his scheme had been a one-man operation, capable of exploding against him at any moment. His luck had held, but the strain on his nerves was beginning to tell. He herded the three others ahead of him, up over the top through the tall pine timber, and out of sight of the main camp. They passed a sentry post – Six ordered Vargas to lift his hat and call out a greeting – and then, beyond sight of the sentry, he halted them and told them to dismount: he had Vargas tie Lament’s hands together and rope Lament’s feet together under the belly of the horse. Then he ordered Vargas to tie Elena Nijar’s hands in front of her – not too tightly. Vargas growled and scowled but obeyed. Then, with the other two safeguarded for the moment, Six tied Vargas’ big wrists together behind him and lashed him to his horse as Lament was lashed.
Marshal Jeremy Six #8 Page 8