Desert Crossing

by Short, Luke;

  Overman scowled. “Why should they come out? They’re keeping us from water, and that’s what they want.” He paused. “Incidentally, the additional troopers and their mounts that you brought in have cleaned us out of water. So we’ve got to fight through.”

  “But what if you could draw them out of the malpais?” Dave persisted.

  “We’d take them.”

  Now Dave rose and moved away from the lantern light out into the darkness.

  Juliana looked questioningly at Lieutenant Overman. “What’s he after, Dick?”

  “Blessed if I know,” Overman answered in a puzzled voice.

  Presently Dave came back and sank down on the blanket again. “Dick, I figure we have more than a half-hour before moonrise.” At Overman’s nod, Dave went on slowly, “That’s why I asked Corporal Chasen to camp where the wagons would screen them from the malpais. Surely one of Noonan’s gang is watching us from the malpais. I doubt if they have a telescope, but even if they have, I don’t think they know that Miller’s men are here.”

  Overman shook his head and grinned swiftly. “Dave, you’re trying to tell me something, but you’re afraid you’ll hurt my feelings. Man, go ahead and say it.”

  It was Dave’s turn to smile. “Thanks. All right, I’m suggesting this. They don’t know that Miller’s men are here. Suppose that in a few minutes we start to form up the train to head back for Layton’s Wells. It would indicate to Noonan, who knows our water situation, that we’re leaving to head back. If they do have a telescope and they’ve seen me, so much the better. It would look to them as if I returned without finding Miller’s detail, wouldn’t it?”

  Overman was so intent on Dave’s words that he barely nodded, and Dave continued. “Once the sentry sees the train forming up he’ll go back and tell Noonan, won’t he?”

  “As fast as he could ride, I’d think,” Overman said.

  “Then while the sentry’s gone and before the moon rises you could put every one of your troopers into the malpais. When Noonan gets the word the train is forming I think he’ll wait for moonrise and then strike. By moonlight a strung-out train would offer an easy target, and Noonan would figure that we’d have to corral again to protect ourselves. Maybe he won’t wait to attack until we form up. At all costs he can’t let us move far, because once our water’s gone he’ll figure we’ll surrender the guns for passage to the Wells.”

  He paused a moment and then went on. “When he comes through, we ambush him.”

  Before Dave finished speaking the excitement had come into Overman’s face. Now he slapped his knee. “That’s it!” he cried. “That’s it!” He leaped to his feet and ran around the circle of wagons. In moments the camp was boiling with activity, and more lanterns were lighted. Both teamsters and troopers fell into furious action, manhandling the wagons clear so the harness teams could be hooked up.

  8

  Dave watched a moment and then said to Juliana, who had been silent, “I’d better tell Bailey and Everts what’s happening.”

  He started to rise, but Juliana put a hand on his arm. “Dave, you’re a kind man really. Did anyone ever tell you?”

  “Nobody ever had a reason to,” Dave said, almost gruffly.

  Juliana smiled. “Dick has, so I’ll say it for him.”

  “We’re not out of this yet,” Dave said. “If we get out of it, it’ll be thanks to Dick and his troopers.”

  “Who invariably do what you gently suggest, Dave.”

  In embarrassment Dave rose, and turned and headed for the supply wagon where Everts and Bailey had been yarning with the troopers. It was here that Lieutenant Overman found him and drew him aside. “Dave, my detail will take the north side of the road. I wish you’d lead a detail to cover the south side.”

  “A one-eyed man isn’t supposed to see well at night,” Dave said, drily.

  “I know one who will, all right. Will you take the detail?”

  “Sure,” Dave said.

  “I’ve put Wilson to helping your teamsters. I guess it doesn’t matter how fast we get hooked up, just so it looks as if we’re moving.”

  Dave nodded assent.

  On the far side of the corralled wagons Corporal Chasen and his men were readying themselves for the foray. The case of ammunition had been broken out and the men were clustered around it as Corporal Chasen doled it out. Trooper Adams waited till the last man was supplied and then he limped up to Chasen. He was wearing a pair of borrowed boots too big for him, which made him look faintly ridiculous. When Chasen looked up and saw this slight, almost wizened figure, he smiled.

  “I thought the lieutenant told you to stay off your feet, Adams.”

  Adams, too, smiled, which was a rare thing for him. “Corporal, I got a favor to ask.”

  “Go ahead and ask it.”

  “I want to go along.”

  Corporal Chasen frowned, then said in a kindly voice, “We got enough men, Johnny. Besides, I reckon you’ve earned a rest.”

  “No, I want to go along,” Adams said stubbornly. “I belong with you.”

  Corporal Chasen rose, took off his hat, and scratched his head, dilemma plain on his face. “Orders are orders, Johnny, but I’ll ask the lieutenant.”

  “Make it good, because I want to go along,” Adams said.

  Chasen hunted out Lieutenant Overman, who was talking with Juliana and Dave. They stopped talking when he approached, and Corporal Chasen said, “May I talk with the Lieutenant, sir?”

  “Of course you can, Chasen. What’s on your mind?”

  “Sir, Trooper Adams wants to go with us. He says he can walk and he says he belongs with the detail.”

  Lieutenant Overman didn’t answer immediately, while he weighed the request. Then he said, “What would you do, Corporal? Give him permission?”

  “Yes, sir,” Chasen said emphatically. “He’s changed, sir.”

  Overman frowned. “Changed how, Corporal?”

  “Well, sir, he was never much of a trooper before this. He’d dog a job when he couldn’t duck it. None of the men liked him, and he didn’t like them. He wasn’t a troublemaker, he was just nothing.”

  “You think that long hike changed him?”

  “Yes, sir, I do. We were counting on him, and he came through. He saved our lives, I reckon, and all of us know it. He—well, he amounts to something now, Lieutenant, and he knows it.”

  “Then take him along, by all means,” Overman said.

  Corporal Chasen hesitated before he blurted out, “May I ask the Lieutenant something else?” At Overman’s nod he said, “What will they do to Adams for shooting Reardon?”

  Lieutenant Overman answered promptly. “As far as I’m concerned, Trooper Reardon simply died in the desert from a sunstroke, brought on by excessive drinking. I intend to write in my report to Major North that Trooper Adams carried out his mission under conditions of extreme hardship and that I would be proud to have him serve under me. Does that answer your question, Corporal?”

  Corporal Chasen almost smiled. “Yes, sir.”

  “Then get your men ready, Corporal. Harmon will go with you.”

  Shortly afterwards the two details headed out for the malpais afoot, with orders to walk cautiously and not to carry sabers, which they had already removed anyway. The two details skirted the breaking camp and converged noiselessly on the road where it entered the malpais. It was pitch-black in this wedge where the road lay, and Dave knew they were running the risk of bumping into a second sentry. However, he doubted if Noonan would think that two were necessary; only a watcher was needed to keep an eye on the camped train.

  As they moved deeper into the malpais the moon began to come up. And now Lieutenant Overman began to spot his men and Dave’s where the moonlight touched a straight stretch of the twisting road. Overman was careful not to scatter the men too widely or place them too far from the road. Dave knew that Overman could not count too heavily on the visibility by moonlight and that he wanted his men close and reasonably concentrated.
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  To each man Overman gave orders not to fire until he fired. The reason was obvious: he wanted the whole gang in the trap before the jaws closed. A jittery trooper at the far end who fired at sight could ruin the whole plan, and he impressed this on each man.

  Dave took a place nearest the camp and carefully climbed up into the still warm malpais. The edges of the rock were razor-sharp and it was difficult to find a hand hold without cutting his palms. When he was some feet above the road he sat down on a rock which gave him clear sight of it in the growing moonlight.

  Only now, in this utter stillness, did Dave have the chance to reflect on everything Juliana had told him since he returned to camp. He was not surprised that Thornton had deserted, but he wondered how Thornton proposed to continue his journey. It really didn’t matter, Dave thought. What mattered was that Juliana didn’t love him and that his conduct these last few days had wrecked any friendship between them. He suspected that Thornton’s proposal to give Noonan’s gang the rifles had opened the breach and that his desertion had widened it irrevocably.

  Dave was aware, too, that Juliana liked him, and he wondered again if it was possible for an attractive girl to love a man with only one good eye. He had seen Army wives accept with stoicism the physical mutilations their husbands had suffered in battle. These disfiguring wounds seemed in no way to change their loyalty and love for their men. That was understandable, Dave thought, because they had known and loved their whole men, and were bound to them by marriage vows if nothing else. But would any of them, meeting such a mutilated man for the first time, have chosen him? It was true that women married men not for their physical perfection, but for the intangible values of the spirit, for their goodness, for their honesty, and for their kindness. Many an ugly woman had these same virtues, but would a man, given the choice of a pretty woman with these same virtues and an ugly one, choose the homely one? He didn’t think so.

  His thoughts were interrupted by the distant faint sound of the clatter of shod hooves on rock. The plan was working then, Dave thought, unless this was a rare immigrant train traveling in the relative coolness of the night. He listened carefully as the sound increased in volume, and he noted the lack of the telltale jolting of wagon wheels on rock. No, these were mounted men, and soon they would know if it was Noonan’s bunch.

  Moments later, rounding the bend, the horsemen came in sight, riding two abreast in the moonlight. One of the first pair was Sergeant Noonan, his arm still in his trooper’s neckerchief sling. The sight of him sparked a slow wrath in Dave, and he thought: If he gets to me, he’s mine. Noonan was willing to sacrifice more than a dozen people to gain rifles to sell. The Apaches, Dave thought, at least had a reason for killing the men who were invading their homeland. Noonan had no reason at all save greed.

  As the double line of horsemen came on, Dave counted thirteen men. Now they were roughly in the center of the area where Overman had spotted his men. Dave raised his rifle and waited impatiently for Overman’s shot.

  When the shot came, it was followed by a roar of gunfire erupting into the night. Dave spent a maddening two seconds trying to find his front sight and, not finding it, still fired at Noonan. As he levered in his second shell, he saw the wild tangle of milling horses, some with empty saddles, as the fusillade from the rocks continued. A riderless horse broke into a gallop below him, and now Dave saw that Noonan, still in the saddle, was going to try to break through.

  This time Dave took no chances. He aimed at Noonan’s horse and fired, and the horse’s knees buckled and it plunged to earth. Noonan went flying over the horse’s head, landed on his side, rolled over, and raced for the rocks all in one fluid motion. Again Dave shot, and again he knew he had missed.

  Another riderless horse passed, and now Dave, in a cold rage at his own ineptness, discarded his rifle, drew his pistol, and clambered down the rocks. He raced across the road, skirting Noonan’s downed horse, and was almost run down by a horse whose rider had both arms wrapped around his belly and who was howling with pain.

  Dave achieved the malpais on the far side of the road and began to climb. Noonan, he reckoned, could not go far with his wounded shoulder, which very likely had been reinjured in his fall. Holstering his pistol, Dave concentrated on climbing. He ignored the sharp, cutting edges of the malpais and plunged up the slope.

  The withering rifle fire was still hammering behind him as he climbed. He labored up the slope until he was gagging for breath, and then he rested a moment, looking down at the scene of carnage.

  Men’s bodies were scattered on the road and two horses were down. One of the prone figures was firing up the slope and half a dozen rifles were searching him out. The rest of the troopers had ceased fire for lack of a target. Now Dave looked to the east into the upended malpais. He was sure that he had climbed higher than Noonan, and that Noonan was to the east and below him, probably hiding.

  Slowly, then, Dave bent over and started his slow, silent way across the malpais, angling downward and in the direction of the camp. The firing had ceased now, and Dave heard the excited shouts of the troopers below. He quietly pushed on, and then below and ahead of him he heard a rock fall. He quickly sank behind a chunk of malpais and listened. The sound grew closer, and accompanying it was the sound of boots scraping on the malpais.

  Abruptly, then, a figure appeared some thirty feet ahead of him between several low chunks of malpais. Noonan was bent over and Dave heard his great sobbing heaves as he fought for breath. Then Dave rose and stepped from behind his rock, gun in hand.

  “Stop right there, Noonan!” he ordered flatly.

  Noonan straightened abruptly and in a panic of haste raised his gun and fired blindly. It was way wide of Dave, and now Dave’s own gun was lifted. He sighted briefly, the moon glinting on the gunbarrel, before he fired.

  A great roaring sigh escaped Noonan as he fell backwards downhill and was hidden in the malpais.

  Gun ready, Dave cautiously climbed down. He knew that he had hit Noonan, but he also knew that if there was a spark of life left in the man he would still fight. But when he saw Noonan’s body from a distance of some ten feet, it did not stir. Dave moved down to it and knelt beside it. He could see by the moonlight that his slug had caught Noonan full in the chest, and Dave guessed that he was dead before he hit the earth.

  Twelve of the thirteen men that comprised Noonan’s gang were killed in the ambush, and Lieutenant Overman ordered the bodies laid in a ravine in the malpais. The burial detail would cover them with rock in the morning. Once that grim chore was done and the two dead horses dragged off the road, the troopers and Dave headed back for camp in the moonlight.

  Waiting for them were Juliana and the remaining four teamsters, who had managed to round up, with little difficulty, the outlaws’ ten horses. As the weary detail tramped up to them Overman said, “Well, Miss Juliana, it’s over. We go through to the Wells tonight.”

  “Are they—did they—” Juliana began.

  “One got away,” Overman said shortly. “I don’t think he’ll bother us.” Then he raised his voice, “All right, men! Help Harmon’s men hook up. We’re moving to water tonight. How many of you were teamsters before you joined up?”

  Half a dozen men in the circle around Overman spoke up and, pointing, Overman said, “You and you will each take one of Harmon’s wagons. All right, let’s go to work.” As the troopers and teamsters scattered to their chore of harnessing the remaining mules, Dave saw that there were more than enough hands for the work and that his were not needed.

  Now Overman turned to Juliana. “Miss Juliana, I’ll put a trooper to driving your ambulance.”

  “I can drive it,” Juliana said. “It’s clear moonlight.”

  “Sorry, but you’ll obey orders,” Lieutenant Overman said, and then smiled to take the bite off his words.

  Dave said mildly, “I heard Corporal Chasen speak up when you called for teamsters, Dick. If you’ll assign him my wagon, I’ll drive the ambulance.”

 
“I’ll do that,” Overman said cheerfully, and moved off to hunt down Chasen.

  “All of a sudden I’m too delicate to drive the team, is that it?” There was a gentle humor in Juliana’s tone.

  “No, Dick’s right,” Dave said slowly. “There’s the smell of death along that road and we may have trouble getting our teams past it.”

  Juliana nodded understandingly, and then she asked soberly, “Dave, it wasn’t Sergeant Noonan who escaped, was it?” When Dave shook his head, she said, “I think I’m glad he didn’t. I don’t see how such a man could live with his conscience after tonight. It was Noonan who killed those men, not the troopers.”

  “I doubt if he had a conscience to live with,” Dave said grimly. Then, to change the subject, he asked, “How are my two shot-up teamsters doing?”

  “I talked with them just before you came back. They’re thirsty, but then I guess all of us are, especially the animals.”

  One by one, as the wagons were hooked up, they were formed in a line. Overman, who had been assigning the outlaws’ horses to Lieutenant Miller’s detail, joined them now. “I think we’re almost ready, Dave. Oh, I’m putting a dismounted trooper at the head of each lead team when we go through that stretch. We’ll go through one at a time, so if you have to wait, that’s why.”

  Dave nodded, and he and Juliana strolled over to the ambulance where teams were hitched up and waiting. As they passed the troopers, who were exchanging their own saddles for the outlaws’ saddles, the men smiled at them. Even sober Trooper Adams smiled. In spite of this night’s grim business, Dave knew that each of them hugged to himself the knowledge that he had been reprieved from death once more.

  Dave handed Juliana up into the ambulance and unwound the reins as Lieutenant Overman formed up and mounted his escort. Slowly then the troopers and wagons got under way, headed for the cut in the malpais.

  The smell of blood at the site of the ambush made the teams restive and uneasy, but Overman’s plan to place a dismounted trooper at the head of each lead team worked well. None of the teams bolted and the passage was negotiated easily. If Juliana saw the dark stains in the sand and on the rocks, she did not comment.