by Lou Cameron
Captain Gringo said, “There’s no way in hell you’re going to hold it once Weyler finds out you have it. The main rebel forces are miles from here. We’ll take care of the rails and wires for you as we leave, but I wouldn’t plan on staying here too long if I were you.”
Gold Tooth said, “Hey, I’ll pull out when I am good and ready to pull out. I run this sector, see? Nobody tells me how to fight the Spanish. Not even Garcia. I need guns. I need ammo. How many guns and how much ammo you got for me, companero?”
Captain Gringo shook his head and said,. “None. I contracted to deliver to Garcia. Period. I’m sure you’re a swell guy, but you’re holding up the war.”
Then he drew his revolver and added, “Now you’re going to get up on that coal and wave your comrades out of the way. We’d both hate to see Cuban patriots run over by a train, right?”
Gold Tooth stared soberly down at the muzzle pointed at his paunch and said, “I reproach you, señor. Is this any way to treat a comrade in arms?”
“Cut the bullshit and clear the tracks. If you do it right, I may forget you tried to rob the recognized leader of the Cuban Army of Liberation.”
“And if I insist on his sharing the wealth, señor?”
“Jesus, you talk dumb. Start the engine, guys. We can court-martial this asshole later.”
The engineer grinned and opened the throttle as Gold Tooth got up on the coal fast to wave his sombrero and shout, “Clear the track, you cabrónes! Is a special shipment for our beloved Garcia!”
They did as he said, one yelling, “¡Viva Garcia!” The tender rolled over the switch point and seemed to be staying on the main line. Gold Tooth climbed back down and said, “Bueno. We are friends again, no?”
“Let’s not get sickening about it. But you can jump off anytime.”
“Hey, at this speed, señor? We are picking up speed most rapidly!”
“So jump before we’re going any faster,” Captain Gringo suggested, and when that didn’t work, he simply shoved. Gold Tooth flew out, screaming, to land rolling end over end in the trackside dust. As the train rolled on, he staggered to his feet, shaking a fist with his free hand, and when that didn’t work, he remembered the carbine in his other fist and raised it to speed them on their way with a parting shot. Gaston, in the crane cab, had no idea why anyone would want to do a thing like that. But he shot the idiot anyway, picked up his own phone, and when Captain Gringo picked up in the cab, told him what he’d done and why. Captain Gringo said, “Some guys just never learn, I guess. See if you can swing the crane over and knock down some wires. His friends could be poor losers.”
The more serious town of Camaguey was less than an hour down the track. As they rolled into the switch yards, Captain Gringo was wearing the same Spanish officer’s peaked cap and hoped he was so dirty nobody would be sure whether his shirt was army issue or not. Nothing happened at first as they rolled between trackside slums where nobody seemed interested in watching trains but some apathetic little kids. Meanwhile, Captain Gringo had been busy on the phone, and with any luck everyone knew his or her part. They wound through the yards, still on the main line, until they saw a switch engine blocking the tracks ahead. This was not as scary as the yard worker waving them down with a full squad of Spanish military police lined up behind him.
They stopped. Captain Gringo rose from behind the rear plates of the tender, let half his breath out so he wouldn’t sound excited, and demanded, “What is the meaning of this? Don’t you know this combination has highball clearance all the way to Santiago? Didn’t they wire ahead?”
The officer in command frowned back up at him and replied, “The wires are down between here and the west, señor, uh … forgive me, but I cannot make out your rank under all that soot.”
“I am Major Jones, on special detail with ordnance. I have two carloads of guns and ammunition for the fighting front. Have a look, if you like. But hurry up and clear the tracks ahead. The civilians you’ll find locked in the boxcars have been assigned to a labor battalion at the front, of course.”
The officer muttered something to his sergeant, who trotted back along the train with two other enlisted men, port arms and on the double. The officer told Captain Gringo, “We shall have to see your dispatches as well, Major.”
“Are you crazy? Don’t you know there’s a war going on? There wasn’t time for such peacetime nit-picking. They told us to get going muy pronto, and they’d wire our highball ahead.”
“If they did, we did not get it, Major. Jones is not a Spanish name, is it?”
Captain Gringo had known what he was doing when he made it up. He laughed lightly and said, “No, it’s not. Is Weyler?”
The officer grinned crookedly and said, “I am pleased to see your people saw the error of their ways too. But, though I mean no offense, regulations say I am not allowed to take anyone I do not know personally at face value. You have your commission, at least?”
“Oh, sure, we all carry our commissions into combat with us. Mine is framed on the wall in Havana, you idiot. Wire headquarters if you don’t believe me. But make it poco tiempo. The boys at the front need this ammo, damn it!”
The sergeant and his men returned, sliding to a dusty halt. The noncom saluted and reported, “Is as he said, Lieutenant. Enough guns and ammo for an army. I got nothing from the few prisoners I spoke to. They are all most frightened pobrecitos.”
The officer still looked undecided. Captain Gringo snorted in disgust and yelled, “You win. I confess. I’m a war orphan who steals trains and delivers arms, ammo, and laborers to the fighting front because I simply enjoy a good laugh. Are you going to move that switcher out of our way or shall we both go see your commanding officer, Lieutenant? I warn you that I mean to hold you personally responsible for every minute you delay this vital shipment to the front. Maybe you rear-echelon toy soldiers don’t know what it feels like to run out of ammo in a real fight, but—”
“Let us not get all upset in this heat, Major,” the junior officer cut in, nodding to the yard worker with the red flag. Captain Gringo had hoped he might not want to take it all the way up the chain of command. He never had when he’d been a junior officer.
So a few minutes later they were on their way again. Churchill let out a long sigh of relief and said, “You know, of course, there’s not a thing to prevent their wiring ahead?”
Captain Gringo picked up the phone and cranked for Gaston as he replied, “It will take the bozo at least a few minutes to get to their telegraph shack. Hey, Gaston? As soon as we’re out of town see if you can knock down a few poles for me. Don’t start ripping with the track wolf until we’re going a bit faster.”
It was never too clear at Cascorro whether Camaguey had somehow managed a few words on the wire before it was down or whether the cops in charge there were just suspicious bastards. Whatever the reason, they’d piled a barricade of ties across the track and opened fire first.
Captain Gringo took care of the riflemen spanging lead off the rear of the tender with a couple of machine gun bursts. The heavy Baldwin trucks stayed on the rails as they backed through the heavy but loosely piled barricade. The engineer warned that the switch ahead could be set either way. Captain Gringo yelled, “Keep going. Any old way is better than here!” So they did, running a gauntlet of fire from scattered but still pissed-off Spanish soldiers from both sides of the track. One of Captain Gringo’s guerrillas and two of the liberated prisoners were hit. The Spaniards firing from exposed positions didn’t get off half as easy. Better yet, when they hit the switch they found themselves on the right fork, bound for the Sierra Maestra.
Captain Gringo said, “That was close,” and asked the engineer where they could expect trouble next. The engineer said, “Anyone but you would expect trouble everywhere as we draw ever closer to the fighting front, señor. If you are asking where we shall be able to go no farther no matter who you shoot, we must stop for boiler water soon. If they do not have every water tower between here and Bayamo u
nder heavy guard, they do not know we are coming, and if they did not know we were coming we would not have had to run that last blockade, no?”
“When you’re right you’re right. The bastards are professional enough to put two and two together. When you get an early tip from a police informer that gunrunners have landed between you and Havana, and then you can’t reach Havana by wire, you cover all bets. Okay, so what’s at Bayamo?”
Churchill said, “I can answer that. I boarded the westbound with those homeward-bound wounded Spaniards at Bayamo. There was a Spanish division headquarters across from the depot. There was a Spanish artillery battery set up across the yards. The current front runs through Bayamo from Manzanillo to Santiago. The Spanish infantry is using the railroad embankment as its forward breastwork. So Bayamo is most definitely the end of the line, even for trains the Dons aren’t shooting at!”
Captain Gringo muttered, “Shit,” as he studied the crude mental map in his head. He knew the east end of Cuba was a sort of fish hook, with the Sierra Maestra forming the barb as it ran back to the west from the lower central spine of the big island. The pointed tip, where the sierra ended at Cabo Cruz, enclosed the big bay of Guacanayabo. It was safe to assume the rebels held the rugged rain-forested heights almost as far east as Santiago as well, if the original plan had called for the landing beacon to be lit on the smaller San Juan Hill that Esperanza had been lucky enough to mess up on. He asked, “Isn’t there a river running into the bay between here and there?”
He didn’t expect Ciboney to answer. But she said, “Sí, El Rio Cauto, Dick. The tracks must cross it on a long bridge below the head of navigation. El Rio Cauto is short pero deep as far inland as Embarcadero.”
Captain Gringo shot a thoughtful look at the engineer and said, “Oh, swell. You were worried about guarded water towers, amigo?”
The engineer shrugged and said, “There is no need for to worry about them having the span across El Cauto blocked. We do not have the water to get there. As we speak, the pressure gauge is dropping.”
“So where’s the next water tower, damn it?”
“Pueblo Elia, not far ahead. I was hoping we could run through at top speed. Is a natural death trap if we even slow down going through Elia.”
Captain Gringo didn’t ask why. He’d already noticed the trees were getting more abundant and closer to the tracks and that the terrain was getting bumpier as well. He said, “Okay, this time we’ll try something different. Are there any tunnels or deep road cuts this side of Elia?”
“No tunnels, señor. More than one road cut through the rolling ground. One just a kilometer this side of the town.”
“Bueno. That’s where we’ll stop then,” said Captain Gringo, picking up the phone to make other plans with his more serious fighters up and down the train.
Everyone but Gaston agreed on the plan. Gaston couldn’t come up with a better one. So when they halted the train on the tracks in the road cut, half the guerrillas, commanded by Suarez, took up defensive positions on the high ground to either side. Captain Gringo and Gaston led the rest in a two-pronged invasion of the sleepy jerkwater village. Anyone who was sleeping woke up fast when, sure enough, they hit the Spanish platoon dug in around the water tower and siding from both sides. It was over in a few savage minutes. Spotting Gaston’s ragged column moving through the trees across the track from them, the Spaniards were busy peppering Gaston’s guerrillas with their backs to Captain Gringo as he raked them with automatic fire from the Maxim on his hip. Nobody on the rebel side received more than a good scare or a hole in his hat.
Nobody else in town came anywhere near the siding as Captain Gringo secured the water tower and sent a runner back for the train. But he sent an agile-looking follower up the pole to cut the wire anyway.
Less than an hour later they were on their way again, ripping up the track behind them. They ran another gauntlet at a place called Jobabo. But the coal was lower now, and nobody in the tender but Captain Gringo had to offer the trackside snipers a target as he raked them back good with his twin machine guns. A telephone check revealed his own people had gotten off lighter, with one guerrilla suffering a flesh wound he said called for no more than a little rum in the hole and a lot of rum in him. The engineer said the track should be clear as far as the bridge across the Cauto but once more warned it would be suicide to try to cross there. He explained, “The span is long. The far banks are high and wooded. The would have us in a crossfire from up and down the stream. That is assuming they have not mined the bridge, of course.”
Churchill opined, “They will have, you know, if they don’t have the men to hold their end of the span against all comers. By now they must know something bloody awful seems to be coming.”
Captain Gringo thought and said, “Okay, suppose we stop just this side and wait until dark? If we can’t get across, they can’t get across, and if we send skirmishers over on foot to hit them from both sides—”
“How?” asked Churchill. “This girl just told you they send ocean-going vessels up the river well above the perishing bridge.”
Captain Gringo grimaced and said, “Yeah, it is sort of hard to swim with a gun and enough ammo to matter.” He turned to the girl and asked her, “Do you think you could find your way to Garcia from the river, Ciboney?”
She said, “I know the country to the east as I know my own palm, since it is, after all, my country. Pero while I know el general must be somewhere in the hills beyond, I do not know just where, and the Sierra is about a hundred kilometers long!”
“Ouch. The point is that Garcia has to be somewhere, and you do know your way around up there. If the main Spanish headquarters are in and about Bayamo, Garcia will be keeping an eye on them from closer than a hundred kilometers. So that narrows it down some.”
He turned to the engineer and said, “You may as well slow down. We need a little darkness on the subject before we do anything too important.”
Captain Gringo called his guerrilla leaders together in the gathering dusk near the engine as it hissed and burbled on its braked wheels. They had to stand close. On one side of the track a red clay bank rose higher than the smokestack. On the south side the ground fell away to the depth of a chaparral-filled ravine at an alarming angle. The scout he’d sent ahead on stopping had reported back that, sure enough, the wide and deep Rio Cauto was just around the bend ahead, and while the bridge was intact and deserted, they couldn’t say what the hell might be dug in among the trees on the far shore.
Captain Gringo said, “Bueno, first things first. The refugees from the reconcentrado are going to have to manage on their own for now. Those who want to join us as fighters may. The others are in good shape to scatter anywhere they feel like scattering. We’re in well-wooded country now, and anyone who can’t hide behind a tree deserves to be recaptured. Suarez, as soon as you have everybody out of those cattle cars, I want the cars off the track and down there in the bushes. You figure out how. You got plenty of guys to shove with.’’
As erstwhile railroad laborer said, “Let me take care of that detail, Captain Gringo. Is a matter of knowing where to. place the crowbars, eh?’’
“Okay, you just made sergeant, Castro. Suarez, you can forget that last order and take command of the high ground to the north. I’m leaving Gaston’s bunch here on the track to hold the curve and that ravine to the south with a couple of Maxims.’’
Gaston blinked and said, “You are? Oh, merci beaucoup! And may one ask where you will be while all this is goings on, Dick?’’
“To find Garcia, of course. We’ve pushed our luck and his guns as far as we dare. This time the mountain is going to have to come to Mohammed.’’
“Eh bien, now you are beginning to make sense. Mais why do we have to treat this train so rudely if we are not going anywhere with it? It most obviously cannot back up, thanks to my skill with the adorable rail wolf. It is just as obvious we cannot go forward, so—”
“So shut up and listen,” Captain Gringo
cut in, going on to explain, “We have no switch or siding to work with here. I need a shorter combo. Just the engine and crane. To couple them together we have to shove everything between over the side, right?”
“Sacré bleu, even the guns and ammo, after all the work we put in to getting them this far, Dick?”
“They’ll still be here, down in the ravine. It won’t hurt metal packed in sawdust to take a few bumps. It won’t take Garcia’s guys all that much effort to pick ’em up and carry ’em, if he’s got enough men. In the meantime you don’t let enough Spanish infantry across the river to even wonder what’s down there in the wreckage. Come on, guys, what in the fuck are you waiting for? We’ve got a lot of work ahead of us here.”
As his followers fanned out to take up positions or take the train apart, young Churchill plucked Captain Gringo’s sleeve and asked what about him. The American thought and decided, “If you head upstream to Embarcadero, you may be able to catch a boat bound for Havana. I know for a fact you’ll play hell getting there by train for a while.”
The Englishman grinned like the kid he was and said, “That’s true. You’re no longer holding me hostage then?”
“Hell, Winnie, you were never being held. You could have jumped off anytime.”
“Now he tells me,” sighed Churchill. Then he held out his hand and said, “You’re all right, Yank. I fear I remain unconvinced about the justice of your anarchist cause, but I shall have to report that some rebels, at least, don’t seem quite as beastly as our Spanish allies make them out.”
“Aw, mush, get going while there’s still light enough to find the path. Tell Suarez I said it was okay.”
The young reporter scampered up the steep clay slope on his stocky legs, turned to toss Captain Gringo a parting salute from the crest, and vanished. He didn’t get to see the horrendous crashes of rolling stock that followed his departure. He no doubt heard them, miles away, as everything but the crane, engine, and tender rolled down the steep slope. The ammo on the flatcars didn’t explode on hitting bottom. So it was safe to assume the contraband was still okay, even though, to look down at the wreckage, one would never suspect anything of value could be salvaged from such a tangle.