by Lou Cameron
The Home of Great Western Fiction!
Dick Walker. Ex-U.S. soldier. Framed for murder. Wanted for desertion by the U.S. Army. He’s a tough, two-handed straight-shooter with a taste for victory. And war is the only game he’s willing to play...
Exiled from his native country he roams through the shifting battle zones of Latin America—the best soldier of fortune in the business. And he’s known as Captain Gringo.
Now, at the end of the nineteenth century, the Spanish are taking over Cuba. The Americans are supplying arms to the Cuban freedom fighters. And ten tons of weaponry and ammo are in the hands of Captain Gringo, the one man who has the grim task of carrying the load through Spanish-occupied territory. And the bad luck to face his deadliest foe—“Butcher” Weyler—the Spanish general who’s launching a bloody gambit to end Captain Gringo’s career ...
RENEGADE 36
GUNS FOR GARCIA
By Ramsay Thorne
First Published in 1985 by Warner Books
Copyright © 1985, 2018 by Lou Cameron
First Smashwords Edition: June 2018
Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information or storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.
This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book
Series Editor: Mike Stotter
Published by Arrangement with the Author’s Agent.
Captain Gringo told himself it was none of his business. He knew the business Chilita was in, and getting roughed up by one’s pimp went with the territory. But the big Yank had a low pain threshold when it came to a woman in pain. So when the flashy dresser across from his table bounced the skinny whore off the wall again, Captain Gringo sighed, put down his cerveza, and loomed in the gloom.
Conversation in the smoke-filled cantina ceased. Captain Gringo wasn’t surprised. He’d already noticed that, as the only obvious Anglo-Saxon in the waterfront dive, he’d been the subject of a certain wary interest. The pimp across the way was too intent on making an impression on the wall with his whore’s head to notice the sudden thoughtful silence. Captain Gringo moved politely through the tobacco smoke to join the loving couple. As the pimp bounced her skinny spine and skull against the cruel stucco again, Captain Gringo tapped him politely on the shoulder and said, “Con eso basta! If I wanted to watch the last act of Carmen, I’d have gone to the opera house this evening, amigo.”
The pimp shoved the girl away hard, and whirled to face Captain Gringo, his blade already out as he hissed, “You wish for to bleed too, cabrón?”
Then he saw who it was, gulped, and got sort of green around the gills. But he’d made his move. He’d flashed his blade and made his brag. It was his cantina and his crowd. Some do-gooder safe in the smoke screen crowed like a rooster and called out, “Stick him, Pablo!” while another announced gleefully, “My money is on the big gringo. Pablo does not have the balls for to fight a grown man, and that man has grown beyond all reason, no?”
Before either of them could come up with a graceful way out, the lady who ran the joint, a three-hundred-pound mestiza called Mamma Menuda, was between them, screaming, “You would have a mano a mano in here? You would dare? Out back with both of you! We allow neither garbage nor blood in here! This is a most respectable establishment, not a bullring, you drunken show-offs!”
Captain Gringo chuckled and didn’t resist as the fat woman shoved him toward the nearest doorway. He hadn’t paid for his last drink, in any case. It got a bit more serious when he suddenly found himself in the backyard, alone with the pimp and the pimp’s knife. Mamma Menuda slammed the door after them and blocked it with her considerable mass. Through the oak paneling they could both hear her shouting, “Sit down, all of you! I run a cantina, not a peep show. When the policia arrive, I wish them to find us all sedately enjoying ourselves like the good children I feel sure we all must be, no?”
Captain Gringo turned to the pimp and observed, “Nobody here but us chickens, Pablo. Didn’t your mother ever tell you it’s dumb to show a blade before you’re ready to use it?”
“Look, hombre, I do not wish for to cut you, but if you make one move in my direction ...”
“You’ll what?” asked Captain Gringo, putting up his dukes and moving forward in a boxer’s crouch.
The pimp crawfished back until he ran out of space. Then, with his back to the garden wall and the blade waving desperately between them, he pleaded, “Wait! I got something for you, if we can make a deal!”
Captain Gringo stopped but kept his guard up as he asked, “What have you got in mind? I wouldn’t touch one of your girls with a dead dog’s dick, if that’s what you had in mind.”
Pablo sighed and said, “Everyone knows you and that little Frenchman you run with do not have to pay for such things, Captain Gringo. Others do. So I make no apologies for the family business I inherited. As I work the streets, I hear things. If you will let me look good, I shall break the code of the streets this one time, to our mutual advantage, see?”
Captain Gringo raised an eyebrow and replied, “I don’t see anything but a muchacho malo who seems to have bitten off more than he’s up to chewing. But I’m listening.”
The pimp said, “Look, I go back inside. When they ask me how this matter was settled, I tell them it is none of their business, agreed?”
“No. I know how the game is played down here, Chico. The guy who backs down doesn’t return to the dance floor. The guy who didn’t does. Why should I make you look like a hero, you fucking pimp?”
“Look, I have to look good in this barrio. It is simply a matter of business that I should be a man it is not wise for to cross. Would you have people fucking my girls por nada, or even mistreating them?”
Captain Gringo smiled crookedly and said, “You were doing pretty good when I stopped you in there, hero.”
Pablo smiled back sheepishly and insisted, “You would hit a puta, too, if she behaved as badly as Chilita. I was only trying for to frighten her. I know better than to really damage my merchandise.”
“Okay, forget about the redhead. You said you had something else for me?”
“You will allow me to look good if I tell you, Captain Gringo?”
The American shrugged and said, “If I buy it. Trot it out and let me have a look at its teeth.”
The pimp lowered the tip of his blade as he sighed and said, “I never thought I would break the code of the streets, but on the other hand I never accepted the contract. So I can tell you with honor, since we are such good friends, that you have been marked for death here in Limón, Captain Gringo.”
The American frowned and said, “You’ll have to do better than that. Everyone knows I’m a knockaround guy with enemies. I’m not wanted by the law here in Costa Rica. That’s about the only reason I can think of for being in Costa Rica this time of the year. Tis the season to be jolly, but I’m not even dreaming of a white mistress, let alone a white Christmas. About that knife, pimp ...”
“Wait! There is more! It is not the policia after you and your French friend! It is an open street contract on both your heads. I was offered a cut if I would have one of my girls set you up. I told them I was an honest businessman who enjoyed life too much for to work that end of the street, see?”
Captain Gringo grimaced and said, “You don’t have a puta in your stable that would even tempt Gaston, and you’d be surprised what a Frenchman will go for at times. Anyone could come up with a mysterious ‘them’, pimp. If
you know so much, give me at least one name to go with your fairy tale and I may not make you look like a fairy after all.”
Pablo licked his lips and said, “I do not know the name of the important family you dishonored. Such matters are not discussed in the streets. But the way I got it, you made some big ranchero most annoyed by screwing not only his daughter but his wife!”
Captain Gringo groaned and said, “Oh, shit, you couldn’t have made that up, and I was so sure neither of them talked in her sleep!”
“You believe me now, Captain Gringo?”
“Yeah. Put away your knife, go back inside, and tell them all how brave you are. I didn’t belong around here even before you told me what an asshole I was with a couple of kiss-and-tells.”
“Is it all right with you if I sort of hint I ran you off?”
Captain Gringo shrugged and replied, “Why not? It’s true, isn’t it?”
Far to the north, at the Morro Castle in Havana, it was dislike at first sight. But war makes strange bedfellows indeed, and both the mismatched men meeting in secret on the moonlit casement of the fort were wise in the ways of war.
To the Spanish official, Greystoke of British Intelligence was a foppish Protestant sissy with a know-it-all expression and a way of speaking Spanish that grated on one’s nerves. To the innocent-looking but deadly Greystoke, General Valeriano Weyler y Nicolou, better known to even his friends as Butcher Weyler, was a typical sadist of the Hispanic variety, despite his Dutch ancestry and cold oyster eyes.
Weyler asked, “Why did you insist on meeting me here in the dark, Inglés? As Royal Governor of Cuba I am free to meet anyone I like, anywhere I like.”
Greystoke nodded but explained, “I’m not. I’m not even supposed to be here in Cuba. Her Majesty’s Government is keeping as quiet as possible about your current crisis, even though for some reason we seem to be on your side. The perishing Yanks, as you know, are backing the other side. President Cleveland is still upset about that little misunderstanding we had with the Yanks down in Venezuela a while back.”
Weyler snorted in disgust and said, “I am not afraid of los yanquis. Let them come. I am ready for them.”
Greystoke doubted that very much. But he was a diplomat as well as a secret agent. So he said, “I don’t think you have to worry about the States intervening on the side of the Cuba Libre junta as long as Cleveland is in the White House. He’s anti-imperialist and doesn’t even want to annex Hawaii. If his political enemies win the next Yank election, however, it will be a whole new ball game. Whitehall is willing to aid you, discreetly, against your home-grown rebels. Getting into a war with the United States over Cuba, however, is out of the question. So what are you going to do about Garcia, while you still have the time?”
“Garcia?” frowned the royal governor. “If you are speaking of the so-called General Calixto Garcia y Iniguez, he is up in the city of New York with the other exiled rebels, making speeches and passing the hat for to buy guns, or at least more rum. I spit on all of them. Palma, Marti, Gomez, Maceo, Garcia, they are all worthless beggars, living off the charity of Señor Hearst, who no doubt regards them as I do, even if he does use their lies for to sell newspapers.”
Greystoke leaned against the breech of a muzzle-loading cannon, reached for a smoke, and struck a light for it as he said softly, “Garcia has landed in force in your Oriente Province, near Santiago.”
Weyler shook his head and said, “Pero no. Your news is most out of date, señor. Is true some rebels attempted for to land over to the east a few weeks ago. My soldados wiped out those who made it ashore. The others were driven back into the sea. You say it was Garcia in command of that ragged band?”
Greystoke lit his perfecto, shook out the match, and said, “It was. After that first attempt was betrayed by Spanish agents, Garcia moved back to Florida with the survivors. The Yanks turned a blind eye as he reorganized and did some rather cruel things to the Spanish agents who’d infiltrated his original guerrillas. Then, with new recruits as well as more guns, he pushed off again and this time made it. As we speak, he’s dug in among the soggy peaks of the Sierra Maestra, and for some reason an amazing number of your Cuban subjects seem to be flocking to his ragged banner.”
Weyler scowled in silence for a time before he shrugged and said, “Very well. Is no secret some of these Cuban scum do not see how nice it would be under the rule of His Most Catholic Majesty, if only they would cut the cane, pay their taxes, and shut up. I do not think we have to worry about any peones left for Garcia to recruit. My men assure me all the important Cuban rebels are now enjoying the comforts of my nice new reconcentrados, no?”
Greystoke repressed a grimace of distaste and said, “Those nice new concentration camps of yours are one of the other things I wanted to talk to you about, General. Far be it from us to criticize the judicial system of a friendly government, but, well, I put it to you that some of the stories coming out about those camps are a bit on the ghastly side, eh, what?”
Weyler shrugged and said, “You were right the first time. It is none of your business how I run my reconcentrados. Is not true my men have been shooting men, women, and children behind the barbed wire. For some reason, the pobrecitos simply die a lot. We have had a bit of trouble with the distribution of food and water and, as you know, this is the hot dry season.”
Greystoke said, “I’m sure your men shoot people you want shot before they bother with locking them up. We’ve had our own problems with crowded conditions at Dartmoor, and the ruddy Irish in Montjoy seem intent on dying even when we force-feed them. Nonetheless, I feel it would be to our mutual advantage if you took my advice about a certain British war correspondent who’ll be joining your army any day now. He’s young, enthusiastic, and, so far, pro-Spanish. If you want to keep him that way, I suggest you send him directly to the fighting front, avoiding all mention as well as sight of your rather grim prison facilities closer to Havana, eh, what?”
Weyler frowned and asked, “Why was I not informed of this pest’s arrival? I do not have a fighting front. I do not allow foreigners to observe any part of my army either!”
Greystoke said, “I know. That’s why Hearst and Pulitzer feel so free to print anything they like about conditions here in Cuba. I just did inform you the lad is on his way, and that he can be useful to your cause if you play your cards right. Like you, he’s a royalist. His father sits in the House of Lords, and he’s ever so proud about a duke on his family tree. He’s not a bad reporter, considering his youth. If you accredit him to your forces in Camaguey and Oriente, keeping him as far as possible from the slums and concentration camps around here, he may write stories about you not at all like those the Yanks have been publishing, eh, what?”
Weyler shrugged and said, “Bueno. I suppose I ought to send a few regiments to scout the Sierra Maestra in any case, if what you say about Garcia is true. I shall allow your little English gentleman to tag along. Maybe he will come down with el vomito Negro and maybe he will tell people in the outside world what a liar Señor Hearst is.”
Greystoke blew a thoughtful smoke ring and said, “Far be it from me to tell you how to run your own counterrevolution, General. But if I were you, I’d send in at least a division. You see, Garcia got the Spanish spies who’d infiltrated his guerrillas. He missed some British agents. So I’m in a position to inform you it will take at least a division, with mountain artillery.”
Weyler laughed incredulously and asked, “For what? To deal with a ragged band of mere bandidos?”
Greystoke said, “Garcia doesn’t consider himself a bandit. He thinks he’s leading an army of liberation. It’s getting bigger every day. He’s still short on guns and ammo. He won’t be able to move out of those jungle-covered hills until he has arms for all his followers. But you were right about their passing the hat up in New York. So more guns and ammo should be arriving any moment now.”
Weyler said, “Not if I seal off the coast from, say, Camaguey east and send in at least a divi
sion, with artilery, for to blow Garcia and his beggars back into the trees they came down from, eh?”
Greystoke nodded and said, “I thought you’d see it that way. I’ll see that our little reporter sees nothing but the nicer parts of Havana until your lads are ready to march against Garcia, eh, what?”
Weyler nodded and said, “Bueno. Bring him to the dinner party we are holding at my palace manana evening. I shall see he is fixed up with a Cuban lady who shall distract him, if she knows what is good for her, until my forces are ready for to leave by rail for Santiago. How is this young aristocratic reporter called?”
Greystoke said, “Churchill. Winston Spencer Churchill. His father’s Lord Randolph Churchill of the Tory party. Young Winston’s not in line for the title, though, so it’s doubtful he’ll ever amount to much. But as a reporter he can be useful to your royalist cause, provided you can keep him away from your perishing concentration camps. His mother is Yankee, you see, and you know what dangerous ideas Yanks have about the simple facts of life, as more sensible people see them.”
Gaston Verrier, late of the French Foreign Legion, was on his way to the posada he’d checked into with Captain Gringo when he was grabbed from behind and hauled into a dark alley. Grabbing the dapper little Frenchman from any direction was about as safe as grabbing a basket of cobras. But Captain Gringo knew where Gaston packed his .38 and neck-sheathed dagger. So he was able to stay alive until his older friend recognized him and settled for just cursing him in French, Spanish, English, Arabic, and several exotic Indian dialects.
Captain Gringo said, ‘‘Take it easy. We got trouble. I was laying for you in this alley because our rooms at the posada could be staked out.”
Gaston smoothed his rumpled linens and replied, “Merde alors, that is what I was just on my way to tell you, my ham-handed youth! A tits friendly lady of the evening just told me I was too hot to spend the whole night with her. I took this as a tribute to my virility until she arrived at the part about an open contract on my senile balls! I thought Costa Rica was the one place they were safe in!”