Raul grew older, enjoying a close relationship with his grandfather, but in due course his restless soul could not bear the inactivity or even the unending debauchery his free time allowed him in the larger towns of Sonora. Raul informed his father and brothers of his intentions to go off and see what else could be experienced in that border country of the United States and Mexico. Since he was a cool-headed young man who could take care of himself, his father gave him permission to roam and seek satisfy his curiosity about the rest of the world.
For a while Raul simply spent his time on both sides of the border getting acquainted with the area. He fit in well because of his fluency in both English and Spanish, and he made a number of friends. But in due course a couple of dangerous incidents occurred in which he ably defended himself with his quick gun and calm courage. Before long he had earned a reputation as a skillful and dangerous gunfighter. Consequently, Raul’s services as a pistolero began to be sought from time to time, but he would only accept jobs to right a wrong, or as a bodyguard. Raul Mackenzie was no one’s paid assassin, and he held such men in contempt.
~*~
Now, engaged in his new job of ransoming F.T. Slattery’s niece, Raul rode across the arid flatness of the Great Sonoran Desert. A spring existed midway between San Tomas and where El Demonio kept his camp in the Escondido Mountains. Its existence was known by those familiar with the area, but strangers passing through knew nothing of the source of water. Many of the ignorant wayfarers had died of thirst within a kilometer or two of the spring.
If the tiny flow had been larger, an entire town might have been built around it. But as it was, its small bit of water would only slake the thirst of a few men and their horses before dwindling into a mud hole that would take another couple of days to fill up again.
Raul reined up and dismounted by the spring. Borrasca whinnied softly and stuck his nose into the cool water as Raul joined him. Both man and horse drank deeply, enjoying the cool wetness that eased their throats.
“Please do not move, señor.”
Raul could sense the gun aimed at his back and, worst, the nervous fear in the voice that spoke. He would prefer to have a calmer man throw down on him. “Whatever you say, señor. Is there some way I can help you?”
“I am the owner of this spring. You must pay me for the water you take.”
“That would seem only fair,” Raul agreed. “And how much do I owe you?”
“Two pesos for the horse, and one for you. That makes three pesos, señor.”
“Certainly. Most generous terms on your part. Shall I pay you now?”
“Yes,” the gunman said. “But please rise very slowly and carefully.”
“As you wish.”
Raul got to his feet and turned around to note there was a carbine pointed at his belly. He was also surprised to look into the face of a frightened young peon, his white peasant garments bearing the alien accoutrements of a holstered pistol and ammunition belts over his shoulders. He was a short, skinny kid appearing to be in his late teens or early twenties. His eyes were large and showed a lack of malice despite a frown and drooping moustache.
“I must reach inside my chamara for the money,” Raul said
“I will get the money,” the peon sternly ordered. “You will, please, keep your hands up.”
“Of course.”
The young man cautiously approached him, reaching out with one hand while awkwardly holding onto the carbine with the other. It was so easy, Raul almost laughed. He quickly grasped the outstretched hand and pulled the peon toward him with a sudden jerk. As the boy lost his balance, Raul simply reached over and took the weapon away from him. Now the situation was reversed. The peasant looked at him in angry surprise, then hung his head in resignation.
Raul pulled three pesos from his jacket and handed them to the boy. “What is your name, joven? I always like to know who I do business with.”
“You are making jest of me.”
“I assure you I am not,” Raul declared. “Here. Take your money.”
The peasant stood up straighter. “Go ahead and shoot me, gringo. I will show you that a mexicano knows how to die with courage and dignity.”
“Ay, chingado!” Raul swore. He grabbed the younger man’s hand and stuck the money in it. “In the first place I am not a gringo. In the second place you must do as I tell you because I am paying you for the water.”
“Gracias,” the young man said, taking the money. His face plainly showed the surprise and relief he felt.
“Now tell me your name and what you do around here?”
“My name is Angel Moreno and I am a fierce bandido.”
“A fierce bandido, eh, Angelito?” Raul asked using the diminutive form of the kid’s name.
“Some people think so.”
Raul tossed the carbine back to the astonished youngster. “Do you know what I think, Angelito? I think you are a boy from a nearby village who is either trying to impress a girl or is tired of being bothered by bandits.”
Angel shrugged. “Maybe a little of both.”
“Tell me the truth,” Raul said. “Where did you get the guns?”
“Some bandits came through here and made sport in our village. They did not steal anything because we are so poor. But they got drunk and ran off my goats. I trailed after them to get back my little herd and I found one of the bandits had fallen off his horse from being so drunk. He just lay there in the dirt.”
“What did you do?” Raul asked.
“I became angry when I saw him and thought about my lost goats. So I picked up a large rock and dropped it on his head. It only scratched him a little, so I held it higher and dropped it again. Pretty soon I started throwing it as hard as I could at his head. You know what, señor? There is gray mush inside people’s head just like goats have. I did not know that, did you?”
Raul grimaced, picturing the mutilated bandit in his mind. “I’ll take your word for it.” Raul had seen the results of men being shot in the head, but had never hung around for minute inspections.
“And then,” Angel continued, “I robbed the robber, eh? I took his carabina and pistola for myself.”
“So what are you going to do now, Angel? Keep charging travelers for drinking water here? Eventually you will be killed.”
“That was what I had planned to do, but now I have changed my mind.”
“Bueno!” Raul said, emphasizing his approval. “You go into San Tomas and either sell or trade the horse and weapons and bullets you got from the bandit for some new goats.”
“Goats!” Angel shouted. “I am finished with goats!”
“Then what are you planning to do?”
“It is plain to see that you are an adventurer, so I shall seek my fortune by going with you.”
Raul shook his head. “I am not looking for company.”
“Oh, señor, I do not flatter myself by attempting to be your compañero. I will serve you faithfully. You are now my patron.”
“I do not need any servants, Angelito. You would be better off to sell that stuff in San Tomas.” Raul mounted his horse. “Don’t ever try to be a bandido again.” He pulled on Borrasca’s reins and waved goodbye.
“Wait for me, patron!” Angel said, running toward a stand of barrel cactus. He reappeared from the other side with the dead bandit’s horse. He climbed into the saddle rather inexpertly and kicked the animal’s flanks to make it break into a canter.
Raul decided the best thing to do would be to simply outrun the peasant kid. “Andale, Borrasca!” he yelled and broke into a full gallop.
Borrasca whinnied his excitement and streaked across the desert in his exuberance. Raul, riding hard, glanced back to see Angel remounting after an obvious spill. The peon was after him again in a bouncing gallop. Another check by Raul revealed Angel once again falling from the saddle but gamely holding onto the reins as he slammed into the ground. The boy remounted slower this time, obviously hurting. But he tenaciously pushed the horse into a run.
>
Raul came to a halt. Angel galloped up to him, almost running into Borrasca before managing to stop his own mount just in time.
“Why are you stopping, patron? Is there something you wish to tell me? An order or instructions of some sort?”
“I just want to tell you that I am going to permit you to accompany me,” Raul said, sighing with resignation.
“Ay! Gracias, patron!”
“But only to keep you from killing yourself on that horse. We will continue the journey at a more leisurely pace. But I want to impress on you the fact our arrangement is only temporary.”
“A sus ordenes,” Angel conceded. “But I shall prove of such value to you that you will retain me permanently. Tell me now, patron, where are we going and what are we to do when we get there?”
“We are going to the camp of Demonio the bandido,” Raul replied, gauging the reaction in Angel’s eyes.
The boy didn’t disappoint him. He looked as if someone had just slapped him in the face. “But, patron, what would an honorable señor such as yourself have to do with such a fiend as Demonio?”
“I am going to ransom a captive from him,” Raul explained. “A young woman was taken in a raid. I am acting as an agent for her family.”
Angel smiled. “I knew yours would be an honorable mission, patron.”
“Good, Angel. I am glad you approve. Now let us get moving.”
Angel fell back a respectful distance and happily followed his master.
~*~
Raul was waited on hand and foot during the rest of the trip. Angel leapt into action each time they stopped in the evening, unsaddling the horses, preparing meals and even laying out their bedrolls.
Raul grinned to himself. Now, like Don Quixote, it would seem he also had his Sancho Panza.
Chapter Four
The mesa on which the bandit chief El Demonio kept his camp had appeared as a blur on the horizon early in the morning. Now, at an hour or so past noon, Raul and Angel had reached the bottom of the crag where they would begin the ride up the trail leading to the top.
“Alto — halt!”
They were halfway toward their destination when the voice sounded from a stand of boulders on the side of the pathway. Raul came to a stop, and Angel reined up behind him. Two armed bandits stepped into view. One, a skinny, mean-faced individual holding a rifle, eyed the two travelers. “Where do you think you are going, hombres?”
Raul glared at him. “We have business with Demonio. Why else do you think we are heading up to the mesa?”
The second bandit walked up and looked them over. “What kind of business?”
“It involves a woman whose family wants her returned to them.”
The two lookouts exchanged glances, knowing such transactions were of utmost importance to their chief. They wordlessly stepped aside, motioning the visitors to continue.
Angel Moreno stuck close to Raul as they rode into El Demonio’s camp. “Patron,” he said fearfully. “What if the dead bandido’s friends recognize his horse?”
“Do not worry, Angel. The bandits that came to your village were not part of Demonio’s gang.”
“Of course!” Angel exclaimed. “I did not think of that.”
The camp on the large mesa was a disorderly mixture of cultures that ran from the hogans of Indian renegades to the elaborate shacks of the more civilized elements of the bandit gang. Smoke drifted through the air from cook fires among the dwellings scattered across the area, bringing odors of several styles of ethnic foods and flavors.
The people, who stared in unabashed hostility at Raul and Angel, had evidently settled down wherever it suited them on the flat terrain. Their manner of dress also reflected their individuality as well as what they had been able to pillage during raids. Mismatched, but functional garments were the order of the day, as looted finery was worn in conjunction with worn-out vaquero and Indian dress.
The body of a man hung head-down from a crude gallows erected near the center of the camp. This was El Demonio’s favorite form of execution.
Angel gasped. “One of their victims, patron. Look!”
“More likely he is a bandit who ran afoul of his friends, Angel. These people have a form of justice of their own, believe me.”
“But what could he have done to deserve such a long, horrible death?” Angel wondered.
“Perhaps he killed a friend of Demonio’s or was cowardly during a gunfight. His punishment could have been for many things,” Raul opined. He stopped at a hide tent and spoke to a Mexican who stood in front of the structure. “Where do I find Demonio?”
The man ignored the question, looking with unconcealed curiosity into Raul’s face. “I know you, verdad?”
“Maybe,” Raul responded.
“Ah! You are from Rancho San Andres, no? You are a Mackenzie, there is no doubt.”
“That’s right. Now tell me where Demonio is.”
The man pointed. “He is on the south side, close to the creek.”
“What is Rancho San Andres?” Angel asked as they renewed their slow ride across the mesa.
“It is the name of my family’s ranch.”
“Your family has a ranch? Is it big?”
“Yes. It is very big. In fact, it is so large that even Demonio will not attack it. We have an agreement with him. He leaves us alone and we leave him alone. Open warfare between us would prove unwise and costly to everyone concerned.”
“You mean the bandits do not harass your peones?” Angel asked, astonished.
“They leave our people in peace.”
“Son muy afortunados! How lucky for them.”
The pair was forced to rein up suddenly when a young Mexican woman carrying a pail of water in each hand stepped in front of them. She was not particularly pretty, having a large nose and close-set eyes. She looked listlessly up at Raul for an instant, seeming not to see him as she went on her way. A stolen girl, no doubt, and from the awkward way she walked with the water, it was apparent she wasn’t used to hard work.
Raul watched as a fat, swarthy woman kicked the girl in the backside, screaming obscenities at her in a mixture of Spanish and Yaqui. Raul looked at the scene with pity. The victim was forced to suffer the brutalities of the obese old woman during the day while enduring the crone’s husband and his friends at night. But there was nothing he could do for her at the moment.
Angel also sense the tragedy. “Maybe the poor girl’s parents search for her, eh? Pobrecita! I hope she gets ransomed soon.”
“I doubt if that will happen, Angel. More than likely she is a town girl. Her father is probably a shop owner. It is obvious he would not have enough money to buy her release. And she’s not pretty enough to sell.”
“What will become of her if she stays here, patron?”
“If she survives, she will grow uglier and uglier until no one here will want her. Then she will just walk away into the desert one day. Of course, maybe she’ll turn out like the old bitch that’s making her life so miserable.”
“Pobrecita!” Angel repeated softly. “Poor little one.”
El Demonio’s dwelling as befitted the chief was the largest in the camp. His most trusted men had their own shacks close to his, but none of them boasted a front veranda like the leader’s. The big man himself was sitting with his feet propped up on the railing with a trio of his lieutenants seated near him. El Demonio waited for Raul to show up. He had known of the visitors a half hour before Raul and Angel had even begun the long climb up the mesa’s trail.
~*~
El Demonio was a short, extremely muscular man who guessed his age to be a bit past thirty…perhaps. He had no idea of when or where he had been born. He wore a large turned down moustache under a nose that had obviously been broken rather badly on more than one occasion. There were also scars around his eyes that cut through his thick eyebrows.
He had received those wounds as a boy fighter under the name El Demonito — The Little Demon. He was dragged from cantina to cantin
a by his owner who would bet on him against other youngsters in fist fights. This brutal life was his earliest memory. He was probably taken in a bandit or Indian raid somewhere and bartered off in a camp similar to the one he now ruled. His fighting career had been profitable for his patron until the boy, at fifteen years of age was matched against a much larger lad. El Demonito was badly beaten in the fight. His patron lost heavily on the many bets he had put down. After paying off his considerable losses, the man turned his wrath on the boy fighter. He kicked the youngster in his rage, knocking him back into the crowd of spectators. El Demonito impulsively grabbed a pistol from the holster of a nearby man. The battered lad had reached the end of his endurance. Without hesitating, he shot his master dead.
The man whose gun had been taken, retrieved it. He grinned at the boy. “Now the Rurales will be after you. A trip to the gallows will be your fate, muchacho.”
El Demonito was not frightened. “If I can get another gun, I will kill every Rurale who chases me.”
“You come with me,” the man said. “My friends and I can use a brave boy like you. And you will have many adventures when you go raiding with us.”
Thus, El Demonito the boy fighter was destined to become El Demonio the bandit chief.
~*~
Now Raul dismounted and handed his reins over to Angel, who had scurried respectfully up to him.
Raul nodded to El Demonio. “Buenas tardes.”
“Buenas tardes,” the bandit replied politely. “You are the youngest of the Mackenzies, no? And how are your brothers?”
“They are well, gracias a Dios.”
It was customary in Mexico to never go directly to the purpose of a visit or quickly enter into a serious discussion. El Demonio snapped his fingers and a girl appeared with a tray bearing tequila, lemons and salt. “Sit down, Señor Mackenzie. Let us drink to each other’s health.”
Pistolero Justice (A Piccadilly Publishing Western Page 3