by Ralph Cotton
“Need this necio? I don’t think so,” said Antonio, even as he pulled his hand away from his revolver and put aside the notion of shooting Mexican Carlos.
Sergio gave him a smile. “We will need some red meat to feed to Juan Facil when we find him.”
“Si, Juan Lupo . . . ,” said Antonio, settling back to watching Mexican Carlos go about his unnecessary water raising. “We must feed someone to Easy John,” he said.
At the sound of a gruff voice calling out, “Hello the camp,” the men came to their feet and stared in anticipation toward a turn in the wash. Guns slipped free of holsters, belts and belly sashes.
“Hello the wash,” Burke and Paylo replied almost at the same time.
“It’s me, Gad Man. Don’t shoot at me,” the voice called back to them as Morgan Gadler stepped warily into sight and walked forward, leading his sweaty horse. Seeing the guns drawn and aimed at him, he said, “I knew I better call out first.”
“What’s going on out there? Did you find any trace of the wagon?” Burke asked.
“It’s hotter than nine kinds of hell in a brass bucket out there, I’ll tell you that,” said Gadler. He took off his broad-brimmed black hat and fanned himself.
“Is that all you brought back for us, a report on the weather?” Paylo asked sharply. “If it is I wish you’d stayed.”
Gadler stopped and stared at them, his face and full beard covered with a thick cake of dust, veneered over in layers by dried sweat. “I found the wagon,” he said flatly.
“You did! Jesus, man!” said Burke. Paylo and Burke both rushed forward. The other men—except Mexican Carlos—lunged forward in anticipation.
“Hold it!” Galder said, looking frightened, raising a protecting hand to ward them back. “What I shoulda said is, ‘I found the wagon tracks!’ ” He looked back and forth among the sweaty, excited faces. “The tracks is what I found, all right?”
“Shit,” said Burke. He spit and rubbed the back of his neck.
“But, what the hell, that’s what I was scouting for, ain’t it?” Gadler asked. He took note of Mexican Carlos and the small wet puddle lying beneath his boots. “Has this one spilled his bladder?”
“I’m raising water,” Mexican Carlos said, stepping away the dark spot beneath him.
“Never mind him,” Burke growled at Gadler. “Tell us about the wagon tracks. How far away are they? Why didn’t you stay on its trail?”
“I figured I best get the news back to the rest of yas,” said Gadler.
“We would have come to you,” said Burke.
“Yeah, and for all I know you might have thought I was cutting out on you, going to take all that gold for myself,” said Gadler.
“That’s not what we’d of thought,” said Burke, knowing full well it was exactly what he would’ve thought. “How far are the tracks from here?”
“Eleven miles or so,” said Gadler, “as the crow flies.”
“We ain’t crows, and we ain’t flying!” Paylo suddenly raged, his Colt streaking up from his belly holster. “If I ever again hear you say ‘As the gawddamned crows fly’!”
“Put the gun away, Paylo. Let’s get the hell out of here, and track that wagon,” said Burke. “For all we know that lawman is still dogging us!”
“If the lawman got to the bridge, he’s lying down in the gorge right now, him and Ted Hugh counting all the rocks in their face,” said Paylo, uncocking his Colt and lowering it. “If there’s one thing I know for sure, it’s how to fell a bridge.”
“Still and all, no gunfire,” Burke demanded, already gathering his horse’s reins, the rest of the men doing the same. “Not until we get that wagon in sight. Then we’ll do enough shooting to raise the dead.” He stepped up into his saddle, jerked his horse around toward Morgan Gadler and stared down at him expectantly. “Well?” he said impatiently, feeling hot, sweaty and irritable with the bulletproof vest on beneath his shirt.
The tired gunman had hoped to sit down out of the searing heat and rest himself and his horse. But he saw that Burke would have none of it. “I’m coming,” he said, raising his sweat-stained hat back onto his head and reaching for his saddle horn. Once in his saddle, he led the men along the dry wash the first fifty yards, then turned the lead over to Burke as they filed up onto the trail of hoofprints Gadler had left around a steep mound of sand.
Shaw followed the tracks of the horses until he saw all but one set turn and go down into the wash, while a single set rode on across the rolling sand hills toward the middle of the sand basin. One rider had gone on scouting the desert ahead for the others, he deduced.
He rode over to the lower edge of the wash and studied it closely before riding down into it. Only when he noted the tracks all leading off along the wash and out of sight around a nearby turn did he ease both horses down the cut bank. With rifle in hand he followed the tracks for the next hour, stopping only for a few minutes at a time to rest both horses along the way. He had to remind himself to keep an easy pace, sensing the distance between himself and the gunmen drawing closer with each rise and fall of his horses’ hooves.
A mile ahead of him, Red Burke stood in his stirrups and stared through a pair of binoculars at the freight wagon and the two horsemen sitting at the edge of a long stretch of sand flats. “By God, sir,” he said to Paylo, sitting on his horse beside him, “we’ve got them where we want them! I couldn’t have hoped to catch them in a better spot.” The two had left the others waiting five yards behind them.
“Let me see,” said Paylo. He quickly finished wiping his gritty face and stuffed a wadded up bandanna inside his shirt. “I always knew I’d come upon a big chunk of riches someday. It’s all that kept me going at times.” He took the binoculars and looked out through them.
“Do you see them?” Burke asked, quickly getting impatient with him. “Come on, come on, we ain’t got all damned day.” He snapped his fingers toward Paylo, wanting the binoculars back.
Paylo lowered the binoculars and handed them back to Burke. With a serious expression, he said, “I’m ready to ride in and kill all three . . . leave nothing alive but the horses pulling it.”
“Now you’re talking,” said Burke. He raised his hand and waved the other five riders up around them. “All right, everybody, listen up,” he said. “The wagon is out there. I recognized Juan Lupo driving it. There’s two men on horseback escorting him.”
“What’s our plan?” Mexican Carlos asked, getting excited at the prospect of more gold than he had ever seen in his life about to become his. His horse spun in a full circle.
“Our plan is to get closer before they see us. Then we ride them down, kill them, get our hands on the wagon and take it somewhere safe where we can pillage it without interruption.” He gave a dark grin. “Any questions?” he asked, knowing what an advantage he had riding into gunfire wearing the bulletproof vest.
Shaw had first watched the dark specs move across the sands flats in the harsh glare of sunlight. When he stretched the telescope open and gazed through it, he saw the dark specs grow into riders. He recognized Red Burke in the lead, riding his horse at a quick but restrained clip. Saving it up for a charge, Shaw surmised.
But he himself wouldn’t have that option. He needed to get close enough to start dropping them as they made their attack. He swung a bandoleer of rifle ammunition over his shoulder. Keeping his horse’s reins in hand, he slid from his saddle over onto the barebacked speckled barb. Finding the hard-boned barb rested and ready to run, he batted his boot heels and felt the animal bolt forward. When both horses reached a fast pace, he turned loose the other horse’s reins and let it run freely beside him.
In the middle of the sand flats, Juan Lupo had stopped the wagon and stepped down to check on the team horses. On his way back to the driver’s seat, he looked out across the flats and saw the dark specks riding toward them at the head of a large cloud of dust.
“We have visitors,” he said quickly, but coolly. Without waiting for a reply, he stepped back i
nto the driver’s seat, unwrapped and picked up the traces. Releasing the long oaken brake handle, he retrieved the Winchester from against the seat beside him and checked it. “I’ll head straight for the foothills,” he said, nodding toward the hazy purple hill line in the distance west of them. “You’ll find me there among the rocks.”
“You bet,” said Dawson. He swung his horse in close, raised his Colt from his holster and fired two rapid shots into the air above the team horses’ heads.
Hearing the shots and seeing the team horses break into a run, Burke spurred his mount into a hard gallop and shouted back over his shoulder, “Spread it! It’s commenced!” He raised his rifle and fired on the run. Around him the others began doing the same, each of them fueled by the thought of a wagonful of minted gold coin, theirs for the taking.
Chapter 16
When Red Burke and his men began firing at the wagon, Shaw put the speckled barb into a hard run. His rifle in hand and ready, he held his fire until he circled to the right and put himself into a position that did not risk a stray bullet going toward Dawson, Caldwell and Juan Lupo. Once he knew his line of fire was safe, he raised his rifle just as Morgan Gadler spotted him and let out a loud yell to draw the others’ attention to Shaw.
As Gadler turned his gun toward him and fired, Shaw let loose his first shot and watched the gunman fly from his saddle. Gadler hit the sand and rolled along, raising a cloud of dust until he stopped and lay facedown, dead.
As Gadler went down, Burke shouted at Paylo riding beside him, “There’s that damned lawman who’s supposed to be dead!”
Paylo only gave a sidelong glance, the two of them pounding along, their horses at a dead heat. The rest of the men rode spread out across the sand. After Shaw’s rifle shot, they divided their fire between him and the two lawmen who had taken prone positions in the sand, to protect Juan Lupo and the fleeing wagon.
Shots from the two lawmen ripped through the air, causing Mexican Carlos and the three other Mexicans to veer and spread out even more. With a loud yell, Carlos returned fire repeatedly, holding a big horse pistol with both hands. His reins lay tied together in his lap. His horse raced along at a full run.
“Got him,” Dawson said to Caldwell, seeing the big horse pistol getting closer.
Before Carlos had gotten close enough for the pistol fire to be effective, Dawson’s shot hit him high in the left shoulder. The impact twisted Carlos backward off his saddle, but his boot stuck tightly in his leather-cased stirrup. The running horse dragged Mexican Carlos away, screaming in a bellowing cloud of dust.
From his prone position, Caldwell aimed through the dust and fired just as Paylo sent a rifle shot past the two lawmen toward the fleeing freight wagon. Caldwell’s shot ripped Paylo from his saddle and sent him rolling, dead on the ground. Paylo’s bullet whistled past Juan Lupo’s head, but Lupo neither slowed nor looked back. He kept the team horses running full bore.
Seeing Paylo go down, and not wanting to go down himself, Burke veered his horse into the thickest part of the rising dust cloud and raced away, feeling the bite of a bullet strike his protecting vest with a solid thump at shoulder blade level.
“Damned Mexicans!” he cursed to himself, having felt the wild shot come from the direction of Sergio, Ernesto and Antonio. Feeling a warm liquid on his shin, he looked down to see if was blood. But he saw no blood, only water from where a bullet had sliced through the canteen hanging from his saddle horn. “Hell, don’t worry, you’re bulletproof!” he said aloud to himself, spurring his horse on through the thick dust.
Avoiding the dust, the three Mexicans swung wide of the lawmen and tried to head around them toward the wagon. But the lawmen turned with them and kept firing. Approaching the two, Shaw swung around with Sergio, Antonio and Ernesto and slid his barb to a halt. He jumped down from the horse’s bare back, dropped to a knee, took careful aim and fired, mindful of Juan Lupo being out in front of his target.
Caldwell and Dawson saw Shaw’s shot slam Antonio in the back and send him flying sidelong from his saddle. Also rising from the ground into a knee-firing position, the two concentrated their fire on the Alevario brothers who had drawn closer together in pursuit of Juan Lupo. Shaw did the same. “Ayiiii!” Ernesto screamed as a bullet punched through his back and splattered blood on his saddle horn, his lap, and his horse’s neck. Falling forward, he wobbled in his saddle and managed to shout to Sergio, “Oh, my brother, I am dead!”
Sergio caught a glimpse of Ernesto falling from his saddle beside him. “So am I, mi hermano,” he said. He dropped his rifle and raced on, alone, knowing that behind him the three lawmen had turned their shots on him. He felt the hard impact of bullets hit him, followed by their cracking sound, resounding across the broad sand basin.
When the last of the three Mexican gunmen had fallen, Caldwell and Dawson scanned the desert floor for Red Burke, who seemed to have disappeared. “Shaw’s got him,” Caldwell said hopefully.
But they watched as Shaw searched in vain to find Burke in the roiling dust that rose high and wide across the basin. Finally, Shaw lowered his rifle and shook his head. Standing, he looked toward them and called out, “Catch up to Juan Lupo. I’ll be right along.”
On the other side of the thick, drifting cloud of dust, Burke spurred his horse, not slowing down until he came upon Mexican Carlos’ horse. The animal walked at a leisurely pace; Mexican Carlos still hung from its stirrup by a single boot.
“Help . . . me,” Carlos rasped, his halting voice barely audible.
Knowing he’d need water, Burke swung his horse over, took the other horse by its bridle and stopped it. Without stepping down, he lifted Carlos’ canteen by its strap, shook it and hung it over his own saddle horn. “I can’t be no help to you,” he said, gazing down at the raw, bloody, sand-stripped face that struggled to look up at him.
“H-elp me?” Carlos repeated.
“Help you?” said Burke. “Pard, I can’t even stop to help myself right now.” He stepped down from his saddle, loosened Carlos’ gun belt and pulled it from the man’s waist. The holster was empty, but it was the bullets Burke was after. He swung the belt over his shoulder and glanced back at the dust cloud to make sure the lawmen hadn’t spotted him yet.
With a bloody, skinless hand, Carlos tried to clutch Burke’s leg. “Don’t . . . take . . . my water,” he pleaded.
“Get off me,” Burke said, kicking his hand away. “Go squeeze yourself some damned water, you worthless sonsabitch.”
“No . . . please . . . my foot,” Carlos coughed and wheezed, his lips dry and sand-coated, his open mouth half filled with caked dust.
“Free your own foot,” said Burke. “I don’t owe you nothing.” He turned to his horse and stepped up into the saddle while the dust still stood thick in the air. “The best thing you can do now is die as fast as you can, Mexican Carlos,” he said with a dark chuckle. Then he turned the horse, punched his boots to its sides and rode away. By the time the dust had settled enough for Shaw to see across the basin, Burke had vanished into the wavering swirl of heat and sunlight.
Back atop the speckled barb, Shaw kept watch across the desert floor as he rode back and found his other horse looping along toward him at an easy pace. Stopping the horse he rode, he slipped back onto the saddle and led the speckled barb in the direction Dawson, Caldwell and the wagon had taken.
A half hour later he had followed the wagon tracks and hoofprints onto a rugged, sloping hillside. He stopped before a large rock that stood partially sunken in the ground with a narrow path leading around it. Looking up, Shaw saw Dawson step into sight and call down to him, “It’s about time we heard something from you. Where have you been? Where’s Jane Crowly?”
“One thing at a time,” Shaw replied. He touched his hat brim and rode around the rock, leading the spare horse behind him. “Let’s get together quick. I’ve still got scouting to do.”
Behind the large rock, Shaw dipped water into his upturned hat from a wooden cask in the wagon bed
and watered both of his horses in turn, while Juan Lupo watered the team horses from canvas water bags. While Shaw attended his horses, he filled Dawson in on Jane’s gunshot wound and convalescence in Mal Vuelve. While the two men spoke, Caldwell laid out strips of jerked elk meat and opened an airtight of beans.
When he had finished watering the horses, Shaw shook out his hat and put it back on. Walking over to Caldwell, Shaw said to Dawson, “You remember we talked about who else might have had a stake in the depository robbery?”
“Yep, I remember,” said Dawson.
“Well, here’s a name for you to think about,” Shaw said. “Garris Cantro.”
“The Border Dogs?” said Caldwell, his face turning troubled.
“Cantro’s Border Dogs . . .” Dawson shook his head slightly. “When were you going to tell us?” he asked.
“Just now,” Shaw replied. “I could’ve waited ’til your birthday, but I know you hate surprises.”
“Where’d you hear this from?” Caldwell asked Shaw, a strip of elk meat still hanging on his knife-point, untouched.
Shaw nodded toward the desert floor in the direction of the gun battle they’d had. “The one with the red beard is Red Sage Burke. I shot him and another man down, in Agua Mala.”
“You shot him down?” Dawson asked with a quizzical expression.
“He was wearing a Korean bulletproof vest,” Shaw said. “I expect he still is.”
“A bulletproof vest?” Dawson asked in disbelief.
“I’ve heard of bulletproof vests,” said Caldwell. “The Koreans wore them against the French.”
“So I heard,” Shaw said, remembering Jane telling him the same thing. “Anyway,” he went on, “I winged a third man in order to get information from him, and that’s the information I got. Cantro and his Border Dogs were in on the gold robbery, and they’ll be coming to get it back.”