Vargas stirred. Six looked down at him. The big man’s hat had fallen off somewhere and the front of his vest seemed soaked in blood. He said thickly, “The gun … the gun for Santana!” And died.
Lament stood leaning weakly on the gun’s crank, squinting against the smoke. Sweat gleamed on his face but his eyes shone. “We’ve whipped them,” he said.
There was the wheel and rush of several horses. “Look out,” Six said, turning that way; but the thunder of hoof-beats quickly diminished as the riders swept away.
An army corporal ten feet in front of the black muzzles of the gun rolled over onto his back and tried to speak. Blood welled from his mouth and he coughed once. His eyes glazed over and he sagged loosely. The Gatling gun had stitched a line across his torso. All told, it had fired only twenty-five or thirty rounds.
Jericho Stride came walking into view, plugging cartridges into his rifle. “All done?”
“All done,” Six said wearily.
“Anybody hurt?”
“Vargas cashed in.”
Jericho Stride walked up to them and stood looking down at Vargas. “I hate to think a man like that has to be wasted on a fight like this.”
In the east, dawn turned the sky crimson.
Fifteen
Twigs of lightning sizzled across the sky; thunderclaps roared and rain fell upon the mountains in sheets. A dead horse was a mound, fading away into the drizzle. Disarmed were the two sentries who had been ignominiously tied and gagged during the brief savage fight.
Jeremy Six stood long-jawed over a heap of earth that lay separated from the large common grave into which they had committed the bodies of the slain troopers. Rainwater runneled from the trough of his hat brim until he raised his head to look across Vargas’ grave at the others, standing mute in the storm. It was Jericho Stride who had spoken the words over these graves; Six now turned and led them away.
They prepared to move out. Two horses were hitched to the Gatling carriage; Jericho Stride would lead the team from the back of his own horse, rather than ride one of the team. They released the half dozen extra horses left behind by the fleeing troops and watched those animals bound away to freedom. Jericho Stride stared back at the newly made cemetery, its scrawny wooden crosses half-obscured in the rain. Elena and Holly sat their saddles, enveloped in oilskin ponchos, their heads scarved and hatted. Jericho Stride said, “Toss a coin and those fellows might have been on Vargas’ own side.”
“No war’s as bad as a civil war against your own people,” Lament said.
Jericho Stride looked around at Six and said, “Heroes. Christ.”
“Let’s go,” Six said tonelessly. “We ought to catch Santana this side of Boaca Verde.” He tossed aside the army entrenching spade and gathered the reins in quick synchronization with his smooth rise to the saddle. Muscles unused to such work ached from digging the hard earth.
Steve Lament mounted stiffly, glazed by pain, and put his horse alongside the Gatling gun. It stood loaded and ready to fire, in case of sudden attack. The job of gunner had automatically fallen to Lament, since he was the only one of them experienced with that kind of weapon. A singular group of soldiers, they rode in ragged file away from the scene of bloody victory.
The heavy gun cart kept them to broader roads through the passes and valleys. Rain made some patches muddy, hard going for the horses; twice during the day Six and Holly Moore had to dab their saddle-ropes over the carriage’s doubletree and lend their mounts’ weight to the team’s in order to haul the gun through hub-deep mud in the trail. At noon the rain quit as abruptly as it had come, leaving behind a cool damp wind that sliced through their sodden clothing and made all of them miserable. The trail branched into a broader road, the coach-road to Boaca Verde. The road and its environs a hundred feet on either side were trampled: grass had been crushed and broken, horse dung made scattered heaps. Jericho Stride prodded a heap of dung with a stick and said, “Not over twelve hours old. That’ll be Santana all right.” And since a good part of Santana’s ragtag army was afoot, they had hopes of overtaking him before the following dawn.
Weary and without speech, they rode into the waning afternoon. The road moved at a tangent toward the flatlands, gradually descending, valley by valley. They made camp at sunset, resolving to travel on before dawn so as to catch up with Santana in the early morning.
With no water in sight it was a dry camp, coffee rationed out of canteens. Before daylight drained fully out of the dull sky, they extinguished their fire to avoid discovery. The road was half a mile away to their left; Six had selected a campsite on the brow of a hill, from the top of which one sentry could command the surrounding territory for five hundred yards.
At full dark he lay back under his blankets and glanced across the ashes at Jericho’s shape, slowly stirring with somnolent breathing. Up on the hilltop Steve Lament walked slowly back and forth to keep awake and work out the stiffness of his wound. Holly slept nearby, her face turned toward Six. The moon, a thin wedge, softened her features. Her head rested on one outflung arm; in her sleep she moved, seeking comfort on the hard ground.
Elena came across the camp and sat beside Six. For a while she did not speak. A cloud traveled across the moon and then uncovered it again. Elena said softly, “I could not sleep. I think of Vargas. Carlos will be saddened to learn of his death.”
He made no answer. He noticed that Holly’s eyes were open, watching them; but Holly did not move. Elena said, “You did not have to do any of this, Señor Six. We owe you so much, Carlos and I.”
“I don’t want your gratitude,” he said, more roughly than he intended.
She said, “We are all angry tonight, I think. Death makes us this way.”
“How about you, Elena? Are you angry?”
“I suppose so,” she said. “But I am sad also. Not only for Vargas, but for us all.”
“You’ve got a lot of courage, to be thinking of the rest of us right now.”
“Oh, I do not think of myself much any more,” she breathed. “Only, I should like to live a while longer, so that I may serve Carlos. He will need all the strength he can get.”
“He’s lucky to have you to stand by him.”
“If only I could do more,” she said. “You are a very good man, señor. I hope that no harm comes to you because of us. After all, this is not your revolution.”
“I’m beginning to think it’s mine as much as anyone else’s.”
“In that case,” she said, “I am very glad. Buenos noches, señor.”
“’Noches, Elena.”
The girl turned away and soon settled into her blankets across the camp. Six saw Holly looking at him: moonlight glistened on her eyes. Holly said, “I wish I had her youth. So much hope. She sees the evil in the world but she can still let it pass her by. You know, this morning I listened to the guns, and I got scared. I’m still scared.”
“Scared of what?”
“If I knew, I’d only be half as scared.”
Sixteen
On the hill overlooking the town of Guadalquivir, two or three candles flickered within the ancient church. Above the church, the Governor’s Palace was resplendent with light. Sentries stood at attention by the main gates as Captain Rodrigo Medina rode through them.
He rode between sculptured hedges and neat lawns, dismounted before the marble stair and handed the reins of his horse to a brown-skinned servant in livery. Knocking his gloves against his thigh, Medina went up the steps and allowed the butler to bow him through into the great hall.
A feast was laid out in the ballroom. It was just reaching its end. A white cloth covered the length of the huge table, around which sat the corpulent cream of Guadalquivir’s society or, at least, those individuals whom Governor Orbea saw in that light. A mess of food droppings bespattered the tablecloth. The elaborate crystal chandeliers sent down a flickering light that danced in the dregs in champagne glasses. Men and women sat in various attitudes of stuffed rigidity, utterly gorged. The fa
t Governor spoke from his massive chair at the head of the table; a mutter of polite laughter responded. Medina, standing outside watching, was reminded of a Roman orgy performed with the barbarians at the city gates. Things had not changed very much in fifteen hundred years after all.
Colonel Sanderos sat by Orbea’s right hand. The gaunt, deep-carved face was humorless and Sanderos, alone of the company, did not laugh at the Governor’s pathetic little jokes. His fever-bright eyes lifted idly and caught Medina outside in the hallway, and all but pinned Medina to the wall. Sanderos nodded almost imperceptibly, leaned forward and spoke softly into the Governor’s ear. Orbea frowned, irritated by the interruption; but a moment later he stood up, his rotund bulk slightly swaying, thereby indicating that the feast was ended. The guests left the table and began to wander toward the exits, forming small knots of conversation. No one seemed particularly agitated that there was a revolt boiling in the hinterlands.
The Governor waddled out of the room toward Medina. Sanderos followed closely and addressed Medina in the brusque tone he customarily used on subordinates; “What is it?”
“Boaca Verde has fallen.”
“What?”
The Governor said, “You jest, man!” The Governor was a little drunk.
“Somehow the Gatling gun fell into Santana’s hands,” Medina said. “After defeating the relief column from Ures, he made a forced march directly to Boaca Verde. The attack was made at noon today. With the Gatling gun they made a quick job of it. It is said that a gringo mans the gun.”
Sanderos was staring at him. “Gatling gun or no, we had two thousand troops massed at Boaca Verde, Captain. Did they all vaporize?”
“Many of them seem to have joined Santana’s army.” The Governor raged unreasonably: “Captain, you will not refer to that ragtag band of cutthroats as an army!”
“Yes, Excellency,” Medina said automatically.
Colonel Sanderos swung away, batting fist into palm. He stood looking out through an arched window, staring past the dim outline of the old church toward the outskirts of town, visible between the branches of trees on the Palace grounds. “So quickly,” he muttered. “They have moved with incredible speed. One must give them credit. This man Santana is diabolical. Captain, what is their strength?”
“Lieutenant Silva estimates them at sixteen thousand,” Medina replied evenly.
“¡Leche!” the governor roared. “Milk of thy mother! ¡Cabrones!”
Colonel Sanderos ignored him; Medina only glanced at him. At this moment the Governor was but an obese onlooker. Sanderos was still looking out the window. “Do you believe that, Captain?”
“Lieutenant Silva is not given to hysteria,” Medina said.
“I agree,” said Colonel Sanderos, who, whatever his shortcomings were, was not a stupid man. “If Lieutenant Silva believes them to be sixteen thousand strong, then we must act according to that figure.”
The Governor blustered. “But they were only a paltry few hundred!”
No one answered him directly; he had become superfluous.
Colonel Sanderos cracked his knuckles. “We have always underestimated this man Santana. He is a far more capable general than we had assumed.” He glanced with ill-concealed contempt at Governor Orbea, whose face was red with belching. Sanderos went on: “He cut through the relief column as though it were butter. He managed to get that Gatling gun away from us in spite of our deceptions and caution. He has overturned a garrison of two thousand men. I think, Captain Medina, that if we do not begin to take him seriously now, it will be too late.”
Medina nodded soberly and stood with the attitude of a junior officer patiently and obediently awaiting orders.
“Catacamas,” Sanderos said quietly. “We must hold them at Catacamas.” He swore and turned abruptly to face Medina. “It is the only town between Santana and here. Catacamas must be held, Captain. I will take charge there personally.”
Reality finally seemed to have seeped through the haze into Governor Orbea’s consciousness. His voice roared abruptly: “Crush Santana. Set a trap. Trap him at Catacamas!”
Colonel Sanderos brooded. “It will be difficult. He will expect us to make a great effort at Catacamas. He will be prepared for a decisive battle. Captain, how soon can Santana be in position to attack?”
“He moves very quickly,” Medina said. He spoke truthfully: Colonel Sanderos was shrewd enough to know the answer to his own question. “Perhaps by noon tomorrow.”
“Nonsense,” the Governor said. “It is more than a day’s march from Boaca Verde to Catacamas. His men must rest, they must eat, they must bury their dead. He cannot reach Catacamas before evening.”
“In that case, Excellency,” Colonel Sanderos murmured, “we shall be ready for him if we prepare as though he were to arrive at noon.”
Thus appeased, the Governor subsided. Sanderos spoke briskly: “Fortunately, Catacamas is not such an easy target as Boaca Verde. To attack, Santana must march up the road through the lower canyon. There is no other approach to the town. The flanks of the canyon road are amply provided with woods that our men can use for concealment. We will allow Santana to march up the road until the whole of his army is trapped within the length of the canyon. We will divide our own army into three divisions: one to block the entrance to the town, one to lie in concealment along the sides of the road, and a third to close the mouth of the canyon once Santana’s rear guard has passed through. We will have him in a four-sided box. No warning will be given. We will attack from the woods, from the town, and from the lower end of the canyon at his rear. Caught in a double cross fire, the enemy will be crushed.”
He stood silent a moment, contemplating his own plan, and then said: “The idea has several weaknesses. Let us see if we cannot anticipate them. First, there is the possibility—slim but evident—that Santana might choose to thread his men through the trees alongside the road instead of marching up the road. In that case he would immediately stumble across our troops, lying in wait for him. To counter that possibility, we must hold our men far back from the road until the order to attack is given. Thus even if the rebels march through the woods they will not find us. Second, it is also just possible that Santana might divide his force – half to keep our army occupied at Catacamas, the other half to circle past Catacamas and march directly on Guadalquivir. We must place a division midway between here and Catacamas to forestall that. A third possibility is that he might avoid Catacamas entirely and attack Guadalquivir immediately, but he would be a fool to expose his rear to our garrison at Catacamas. No, I believe the plan is satisfactory. Even his Gatling gun will have little effect against our troops, who will have ample protection of thick forest on both sides of the road. A Gatling gun cannot cut down trees.”
Colonel Sanderos was a master tactician; Medina had to credit him that. The battle plan, so simply sketched, seemed unassailable. The canyon road would become a bottle: a division at the lower end of the canyon would be its bottom, and the troops barricaded across the narrow entrance to town would put the cork in it.
Sanderos said, “If your reports are accurate, Captain, we are about equally matched in manpower. We shall have to commit most of our reserves to defend Guadalquivir while the main body of troops forms the trap at Catacamas. Well, Captain, have you any suggestions?”
“The plan seems good,” Medina said.
“Crush them.” Governor Orbea growled: it was as though he was crouching over a mantis tearing apart its mate.
“It will be done, Excellency,” Colonel Sanderos said. “I promise you that.” He saluted and took Medina outside with him. On the Palace steps, out of hearing of the sentry, the gaunt Colonel gripped Medina’s arm and turned to face him. “Captain, you have allowed a great many mistakes to happen recently. First there was the escape of the prisoner Sagan. I suppose you might blame that on Mendez, who allowed the rebel spies to release the prisoners … but ultimately the responsibility is yours, as it is also for the escape of the two gringos who
got away from here. I should advise you that I am not ignorant of these things. You have let them make a fool of you several times, and in so doing, you have put us all in danger. When this campaign is over you will have to stand accountable for these things. Do you understand?”
“I understand,” Medina said evenly.
“It is good at least that you do not make excuses. Well, then. You will issue field orders for the Second and Third Brigades, effective immediately. I will lead them myself. We will march in one hour. You yourself will take command of the Palace Guard and remain in Guadalquivir. Send my orderly to me. Go, now.”
Medina saluted and left the Palace. At the gate he mounted his horse and dispatched a trooper after the Colonel’s orderly. He rode directly to the command office above the barracks, summoned half a dozen officers, and tersely relayed Sanderos’ orders. When they had gone he left a sub-lieutenant in charge of the Palace Guard, trusting that in the haste and confusion no one would notice his own absence; Santana had to be warned. He went to his own quarters, sent his orderly after his horse, and took out pen and paper. He wrote swiftly, blotted the page, folded it, and buttoned it inside his tunic. When he walked outside the orderly was waiting with a big sorrel, saddled and skittish. Medina took the reins, mounted the horse, responded to the orderly’s salute, and rode at a calm trot out of the compound. Downhill he rode, through the twisting narrow streets of the city; he crossed the square, glanced at the darkened and shuttered facade of Jericho Stride’s cantina, and lifted the horse to a lope when he cleared the edge of town. Once he looked back, hoping no one had marked his departure. His face was drawn, his eyes hollow.
He traveled at a steady gait across the rolling hills. The crescent moon rose and dappled the hills with pale illumination. He rode quickly, a solitary horseman on the empty road. Now and then he raised the lights of a lonely house amid the limitless hilly acres.
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