by RW Krpoun
“So it appears.”
“Son of a bitch,” I slapped the table. “This bastard has been a royal pain. If he’s had his doxie in place for a year, you can bet he’s got money in the pocket of the local garrison commander. Speaking of which, where is the nearest garrison?"
“The Presidio San Felipe is fifteen miles due west of the town, with a garrison of two companies of infantry and an artillery detachment. Rurales use it as a base as well. There’s a small cavalry outpost to the east.”
I turned the glass between my hands, thinking hard. “I would like to spend the night, and store some excess gear while we go get Sibley. The Agency will cover your costs.”
“Of course. Make yourselves at home.” He frowned thoughtfully into the distance. “I should tell you that there is trouble down south…maybe plague.”
“There’s trouble all over Mexico at the moment.”
“Not like this.” The Judge removed his tinted glasses and polished them. “I hear things that make no sense. Bits and pieces, tales that have a grain of truth like the grain of sand that makes a pearl. Not the sort of information I would pass on, as I pride myself in accuracy and quality, except that they are making me nervous.” He put his glasses back on. “I’m an old soldier and a retired hunter of men; my instincts have saved me before and I listen to them. Something is going on down there, something other than the revolutionary squabbling. You recall the ghost shirt nonsense the Sioux got into back in ’90?”
“Wounded Knee, yeah. They thought the shirts would stop bullets.”
“It was a desperate effort to turn back time in the face of a culture-killing modernization. Your Boxers did something similar, I believe. I think some of the Indios, the native people of Mexico, are coming under the sway of a similar movement. Just the beginnings, but these things can spread like a wildfire.”
“Huh.” I thought about that. I didn’t question his judgment-you don’t last long if you don’t listen to your gut. “What I am thinking is to drop most of our gear here with you, ride hard, grab him, and get out quick.”
“As a plan, it has merits,” the Judge nodded absently, clearly thinking about something else. Finally he looked at me. “A few months ago, mid-summer, I received word of a band of Indios man-handling a sledge coming from the far south up to around this area. The sledge was loaded with blocks of salt, and one report said there was something in or under the salt.”
“A sledge? Why would you move blocks of salt with a sledge?”
“You do know that when the Spanish came to this side of the world they introduced the horse?”
“Yeah.”
“The people here did not have the use of the wheel, either. Before the Spaniards arrived that sort of transport was common, I would imagine.
“Tradition,” I said slowly, frowning at my glass. “The old ways.”
“Exactly.”
The Judge provided us with an airy ground floor room in an outbuilding, meals, and stabling at a very reasonable rate. After we ate I sat down with my journal and sorted out the weights.
“So, what’s the plan?” Captain asked as he cleaned his rifle.
“We leave most of our gear here,” I tapped the back page where I had done my sums. “Drop the suits and everything but weapons, bedroll, and three days’ dry rations. Each mule can carry two hundred twenty-five pounds so we load each with twenty-five gallons of water and twenty-five pounds of grain. We ride hard, make it to Sinaloa the day after tomorrow, grab Sibley, and ride hard back to here. Let the animals rest, then head north. We don’t eat or drink anything we’re not carrying while en route or coming back.”
“Eighty miles in three days,” Mac mused. “Tough, but not too tough. The mules’ load will get lighter each day.”
“What about Sibley? We take a mount for him, or put him on a mule?” Captain asked.
“Mule unless he has a horse handy. I was thinking of buying a horse from the Judge, but I don’t want to deal with a strange animal on the way in. We can always buy one after we get him back here.” I stowed my journal and started breaking down the M1911; I had been working with it a lot, running a box of rounds through it as we rode, and practicing drawing, and reloading. I liked it.
“We know anything about his living arrangements?” Captain started in on his sidearm.
“Not specifically, although I have his address and the address of a part-time maid who will be cooperative for the right sum. We’ll have a look at the house, see if we need the maid at all. It’s a small town, just a few hundred people.”
“Our paper going to be worth anything?”
We had warrants from a Mexican judge to arrest Sibley. “Not much more than the ink they’re written with. Thing is, if we get an hour’s jump on anyone who cares about him they’ll never catch up.”
“So Sibley planned to get down here,” Mac drew a fine stone down the blade of his clasp knife. “He hooks it out of Kansas with the railroad’s money, which he hides in false-named accounts in the States, and a rich man’s wife, who he leaves in El Paso. What’s the real story?”
I worked the slide of the re-assembled pistol and started breaking it down again. “The lady in question brought thirty-five thousand of her husband’s dollars in greenbacks with her as a trousseau. That didn’t stay in El Paso.”
Captain grinned and Mac whistled. “A double-graft. Thirty-five thousand will keep you a very long time down here. Live here a couple years, wait until the heat dies down, then stroll north, collect the big payoff, and life is good.”
“He could catch ship and spend the years in Europe, too,” Captain suggested. “He has a lot of options.”
“Keep that in mind-this bastard is clever, and a planner,” I worked the slide and dropped the hammer. “He might have anticipated an Agency response so he might try to buy us off.”
“Thirty five thousand dollars,” Captain smiled at the wall. “A nice sum of money. The problem is the six men the Agency would send after us.”
“Better to take the bonus and go on,” I agreed. “Fast money is risky money.”
“I have to have a reason,” Captain mused, loading the Mauser. “A cause.”
“The Pinkertons are a cause?” Mac snorted.
“Sibley’s a thief,” Captain shrugged. “Only difference between this and being a lawman is the pay. Why do you do it, Mac?”
The big man shook his head. “Money’s not that important to me. I need to be doing something. Being rich wouldn’t change things. What about you, Seth?”
“I like being part of an organization. The way I look at it, the Judge knows that Sibley is here with a bunch of money. He sold Sibley to us, but he’s not the only information-broker, and the next guy could just as easily have sold him to a rougher crowd. If you go outside the law you live looking over your shoulder, and that’s not how I want to live. We finish a job, its steaks and whores and no concerns. Peace of mind is worth a lot.”
Sleep had been shaky and unsettling, but I got enough to get by. Dressing by the light of a single candle, it was good to get out of the derby-and-suit Agency uniform for a while. Dungarees, a cotton work shirt, flat-heeled boots (I am at heart a walking man), and a flat-crowned Stetson made me feel like a new man.
I wore my Artillery Model Colt in an old-school ‘border rig’ gun belt lined with cartridges, and cinched an Army surplus canvas cartridge belt that had .30-40s in a double layer tight across my belly just above the border rig, the buckle centered over the holster so my draw wasn’t affected. After some thought, I wore the M1911 in its odd shoulder holster which actually held the weapon flat against my lower left abdomen just above the belt line, with a half-dozen spare magazines hung on the chest strap. Its placement was unusual, but handy.
The east was just beginning to go to gray when we rode out, the horses’ breath steaming in the pre-dawn chill. Captain and Mac rode with blankets swept over their shoulders, but I like the cold. Trout and Perch didn’t care about the temperature, but they were not happy with
the hour or their loads and were inclined to be vocal about it, which annoyed Pork Chop to no end. In all, we did not present an impressive appearance, had anyone but the night watchman been around to see us off.
The sun burned off the cold quickly enough and the mules settled down as well; they were veterans, well-trained and well cared for, and their loads got a little lighter after every watering break. The road we were on was pretty poor but it was better than going cross-country.
There wasn’t much traffic, and what there was, was nervous. The peons we met on the road moved fast, kept their heads down, and did their best to appear deaf, dumb, and invisible. The reason for this was explained in the blackened shell of a village wiped out, according to the proclamation nailed to a post, for rendering aid to ‘bandit forces’, by which we understood to be rebels. Without a doubt the rebels would retaliate against those forces considered to be loyal to the government, or just as likely, someone handy.
We passed a Rurales patrol, a dozen hard-faced men in dusty uniforms moving north with a purpose. They studied us with bold, measuring eyes as we gave way to let them pass, but didn’t feel the need to stop.
The thirty-mile-mark was hard upon us as the sun touched the horizon and my thoughts turned to finding a good spot to make camp. There were clouds rolling in with lightning rippling across their front, which was pretty when seen from a porch but much less so from horseback.
“Fire,” Mac observed, nodding to the south. I stood in my stirrups and looked carefully, finally picking out a campfire a good distance away.
“Looks like it’s off the road a bit. Might as well see if they’re friendly.”
The campfire was about a half-mile off the road, alongside a deep creek bed that boasted a trickle of none-too-fresh water at its lowest point. A dispirited pair of horses were trying to get some graze on too-short pickets and a beat-up cart groaned under a stack of packing crates. A wiry, unshaven man in a battered workingman’s coat and flat-topped cap was sitting by the fire watching a fowl of some sort roast on a spit. He had a double-barreled shotgun with sporting-length barrels leaning against a carpet bag, but didn’t pay it any mind as we rode up.
“Evening,” I hailed him at a polite distance. “Mind if we share your fire?”
“A working man is always welcome,” he had a big voice for one so thin. “The bird is far from done, though.”
“Much obliged, but we have our own food. I’m Seth, the big fellow is Mac, and the disreputable type leading the mules goes by Captain.”
“Jeffery Gunther, a friend to the worker and a guide to the common man.”
“What brings you to Mexico, Jeff?” I asked after we had seen to our animals; I chose my seat so as to distract Gunther from the fact that Mac, always a soft touch around animals, was moving the wiry man’s horses so they had better graze.
“As the flames of revolution stir the dreams of Mexico’s oppressed workers, I bring the fulfillment of those dreams.” Gunther rummaged in his carpet bag and produced a book, its red cover bearing the globe and stars of the Industrial Workers of the World.
“Selling books?” I tried to sound surprised-I knew of the IWW, having dealt with union men in the Goldfield troubles back in ’07.
“Giving them away-we are a movement for the benefit of the working man, not the worship of profit.” He studied the three of us. “What brings you to this place?”
“Horses and mules,” I lied. “Good market for dray animals. We travel between our salesmen and the herd.” A union man would not welcome Pinkerton agents at any time, and I saw no reason for discord.
“Not remounts?” He peered at me suspiciously.
“That’s tied up by the big operators,” I rubbed my fingertips in the graft gesture. “We’re selling animals for the plow, and to civilian freighters.”
The mollified him a bit, although he lectured us sternly on the rights of the working man and their position as a separate class of society while we heated and ate our supper. Thirty miles had taken enough out of us so that Gunther had a compliant, if unresponsive audience for as long as it took to get around some stew and hardtack.
Standing watches was quietly discussed when the champion of the working man headed into the darkness with a shovel and a fistful of newspaper, but none of us saw Gunther as a threat, and the poor weather should keep the locals under cover, so we decided to risk it. All of us were light sleepers, and our horses were well-trained.
I scraped a rain trench around my bedding in case the clouds opened up, and rolled up into my blankets with my Krag alongside me and both pistols under the folded coat I used for a pillow. The hard travel granted me quick and deep sleep; I dreamt of the blisteringly hot march to Peking under that dust-filled lemon sky and the Forbidden City’s tall walls, but nothing bad.
Drops of rain woke me; checking my watch by the flare of a match I saw that it was an hour short of dawn. “Crap,” I muttered, and struggled upright. I slept with my boots on, preferring the discomfort to trying to fight barefoot in the case of a night attack. Cursing the morning chill and the fat, cold raindrops that were dropping in a loose, slow formation, I adjusted my clothes, changed my socks, and strapped on my hardware before donning my Army-surplus rain poncho.
Mac and Captain were up, roused by the rain or my movement, and with a bit of cursing and hatred for the day we managed to get packed and the animals loaded. As a rule we never unpacked more than was necessary in case the need for a sudden relocation arose.
The mules were sullen over being loaded, but the trip yesterday had taken the starch out of them and they didn’t resist much. Pork Chop sighed pointedly but cooperated well enough, smart enough to be aware that moving in rain was actually warmer than standing in it. I had saved an apple for her, which perked her up a bit.
Gunther woke while we were loading, but other than a grunted farewell he remained in his bedroll under his heavily-loaded wagon, safe from the rain but betting his life on the strength of the floorboards.
Breakfast was peaches spooned from the can as we followed the road, leading our mounts; I added a hardtack to cut the sweetness as my stomach doesn’t like too much sugar, especially in the morning.
The rain pattered against our ponchos and dripped off our hat brims as we moved, and the air was chilly, but I was glad for it: bandits are lazy and the troops on both sides of the revolution lacked discipline-the odds were extremely good that all hostile elements would be in the driest, warmest place they could manage.
The rain picked up to a steady drizzle by the time the day grayed into ‘can-see’ and we could mount. If possible I wanted to get to Sibley before the rain stopped as it would make our job easier on several levels, but I wasn’t overly hopeful. It never pays to be hopeful.
Chapter Three
The sky was still dumping the odd drop of rain as we approached Sinaloa, but the benefit of lessened rain had been offset by a heavy ground fog that had rolled in. The town was built in the west lee of a low ridge that ran north-south; I led us off the road and up onto the crest of the ridge to get a look at the place.
All we could see was roofs, the upper reaches of the two-story buildings, and the church. There were gaps in the neighborhoods where blackened timbers were lines slashed into the mist.
“Awfully quiet,” Captain observed. “What day is it?”
“Tuesday.” My journal had the days of the week marked.
Mac checked his watch. “Nearly nine.”
“Looks like they’ve had trouble recently,” Captain lowered his binoculars and gestured towards the burnt-out buildings. “But it couldn’t have been too bad.”
“A dozen freshly-burned buildings can’t be minor,” Mac shook his head.
“No fresh graves.” Captain pointed at the hillside graveyard. “No Mass being held in the church.”
“How do you get burned buildings but nobody killed?” I wondered aloud, trying to pierce the mist with my own binoculars. “Those burn sites are scattered all around-there is no way a
ll of them are accidental. Not even most of them.”
“It is strange,” Captain confirmed, while Mac lapsed into his habitual silence.
“Sibley’s house should be there, about two blocks into the town from the south,” I pointed out the two-story residence I guessed was his. “We’ll follow the ridge around, come in by the shortest path, grab him, and scoot.” The town’s silence was making me very uneasy. “Captain, we’ll leave you and the horses at the edge of town. Mac, bring the irons.” Mac’s size would make subduing Sibley easier, and fewer people would want to tangle with the blond giant.
“Looks like they got some that need burying after all,” Mac observed as we passed upslope of the graveyard. “Got the holes ready.”
“When did they put up headstones before the funeral?” Captain shook his head. “Those aren’t new graves.”
“Grave robbing?”
“Dunno,” Captain shrugged, but I heard the sound of him attaching the wooden holster to the butt of his Mauser so it would serve as a stock.
I was listening with only half an ear because a half-dozen Chinese Boxers with those strange over-sized choppers had materialized out of the wet undergrowth for a heartbeat, turning into a clump of rocks when I looked directly at them, the Krag half out of its saddle scabbard. Cold sweat ran down my back while my entire body burned with the heat of the China sun. Taking careful breaths, I gripped my carbine’s stock and focused on the movement of Pork Chop’s ears until the feeling passed.
“This looks to be as likely a spot as any,” I dismounted and pulled off my poncho.
Captain surveyed the half-collapsed four-stall stable. “Yeah, good enough.”
Snapping the reins around an exposed stud, I ignored Pork Chop’s disgusted snort-she didn’t like being tethered. I think she saw it as an insult to her training-just dropping the reins would keep her in place for quite some time.
Settling the fingerless gloves on my hands, I dug out my sap and my tool roll, tucking the former in my back pocket and stashing the latter inside my shirt for lack of a better place. Mac was stowing two pairs of handcuffs and a couple gags we had fashioned from bandages.