The Baron Brand

by Jory Sherman

  Another started to speak, but Socrates put a single finger to his lips and no other spoke as the wagon rumbled away from the houses and barn into the dark pit of night. The lantern lights finally winked out and the blacks in the wagon let out a collective sigh.

  Reynaud rode up to take his position next to Luis, who took the lead. The wagon rumbled on and the night took on the sounds of wood and metal and leather under stress.

  Paco flanked one side of the wagon, the left side, and David rode along the other. David could dimly make out the road, rutted with wagon tracks over time. He felt as if the trees they passed by were all full of Apaches and they completed the blackness of the night to narrow his view of where they were going. He looked up at the stars every so often, and when he looked at the occupants of the wagon, they, too, seemed to be gazing skyward.

  Reynaud did not stay at the head of the small caravan long. He seemed restless. He rode around to one side of the wagon, spoke briefly to Paco, and then rode around to the other side to talk to David, with whom he rode along for a while.

  “You do not like this, Mr. Wilhoit?” Reynaud asked.

  “I can think of better things to do.”

  “Matteo tells me you are recently married. You wish to be at home with your wife.”

  “That’s one better thing.”

  “Ah, I wish the same. I am not at home in the wilderness. I am one who likes the fine restaurants, the wine and food of New Orleans, the clink of glasses raised in hearty toasts, the smell of the Gulf, the rain on the cobblestones, the graceful surrey, not the noisy wagon we have here. I miss the beautiful women with dark, flirting eyes, the crayfish and red snapper with their bright aromas. I am, alas, a man of the city, not of this, this bleak and empty place.”

  “Is it the money that brings you here, Mr. Reynaud?”

  “Oh, it is the money, and the adventure, as well. And, I have a score to settle with Martin Baron, a matter of honor.”

  “A matter of honor?”

  Reynaud told him about his sister and Martin and why he had come to kill him.

  “Will you challenge Baron to a duel, then?”

  “A duel? With Martin Baron? Why should I do this? He is not a gentleman. He is not to the manor born. He’s a crude adventurer, a seaman with a disreputable past come to land, perhaps hiding other peccadilloes he committed in other places. No, I would not challenge Baron to a duel. He does not even know the Code Duello, I fear, and, even if he did, he deserves to be shot down like the dog he is.”

  David struggled with the image of Reynaud stalking Martin Baron and shooting him dead on some street, then walking away. He knew that Matteo was a ruthless man, but he had thought that Matteo had some honor to his character, that he was struggling to build a cattle ranch in a hard land and that he was strapped for money. Reynaud, on the other hand, seemed to be a man who was ready to kill for honor, but didn’t seem to understand the word, what it meant.

  Reynaud made David feel uncomfortable, more uncomfortable than he was beginning to feel with Matteo Aguilar. Perhaps, he thought, I should judge Matteo by the company he keeps. If Reynaud would shoot a man in cold blood, without benefit of trial, and Reynaud worked for Matteo, then Matteo must be cut from the same bolt of cloth. It suddenly dawned on David that Reynaud had not been hired just to smuggle slaves into Texas, but to eliminate Matteo’s competition.

  David felt stupid that he had not realized this before. Suddenly, he wished that he’d listened to Ursula and had refused to be a party to the slave trade and join forces with Reynaud, a man he not only distrusted, but was beginning to fear.

  Paco suddenly rode up to speak to the wagon driver, Fidel Rios. Reynaud saw this and reined his horse over to take up Paco’s space.

  “Fidel, stop the wagon,” Paco said.

  “What passes?” Fidel asked.

  “I heard something.”

  “What?”

  “I do not know. A horse, I think.”

  “You are crazy, Paco. Ride back to your place.”

  “Stop. I will speak to the Frenchman.”

  Fidel sighed and tugged on the reins. The team slowed, came to a halt.

  Reynaud reacted with quickness. He rode up to the front of the wagon and reined his horse in a tight circle to confront Paco and Fidel.

  “What are you doing?” Reynaud directed his question to Fidel. “I did not tell you to stop.”

  “Paco, he said he heard some noise.”

  “What noise? I didn’t hear anything.”

  Fidel shrugged. His gesture was barely visible in the darkness. Reynaud turned his head to look at Paco, who seemed unperturbed, calm.

  “I heard a horse let wind,” Paco said.

  “You heard a horse break wind?”

  “Yes, I think that is what I heard,” Paco said.

  “And, where was this horse that farted?”

  Paco waved a hand off to the side of the road. “Somewhere,” he said.

  “Merde,” Reynaud spat. “I did not hear a horse farting and I have the very best of ears.”

  “That is what I heard. Perhaps, too, the como se dice, the pling of a spur. Off there. In the mesquite.”

  Reynaud sat his horse without speaking for several moments. He turned his head one way, then the other. Paco looked at him. So did Fidel, and neither man moved while Reynaud was listening. It was very quiet and the horses were still and so were the people in the wagon. David’s horse tossed its mane impatiently .and began to paw the ground. David jerked the reins with an abruptness and the horse stopped its fidgeting.

  “I do not hear a thing,” Reynaud said.

  “I hear no thing either,” Paco said.

  “I hear no thing myself,” Fidel said.

  “Continue,” Reynaud said, extending his arm forward to point down the road. “Do not stop again unless I tell you. Comprenez vous? Do you understand?”

  “Jess,” Fidel said.

  “Ride back to your flank,” Reynaud said to Paco.

  Paco turned his horse and rode back alongside the wagon. Fidel clucked to the team of horses and rattled the reins across their back. It sounded like a series of slaps and the horses took up the traces and jolted the wagon forward. Those riding in the wagon swayed back and forth with the momentum as if they were mechanisms.

  Reynaud let the wagon pass him by and waited until David was alongside.

  “What was that all about?” David asked.

  “These Mexicans. They do not want to work. They are afraid of the dark.”

  “Too bad,” David said, but he didn’t believe Reynaud. He knew Paco and Fidel. They were good workers and he did not think they were afraid of the darkness. “I guess you told them there was nothing to fear.”

  “Umm. I left them with the impression that they should fear me.”

  David did not comment on what Reynaud had said and Reynaud dropped behind him to take up the rear. The black people in the wagon passed one of the buckets among themselves and David heard the sounds of some passing water and, later, one of the slaves emptied the bucket and he smelled the acrid scent of urine on the night air.

  He watched Paco, who seemed to be more wary than before. Paco turned his head often as if he was trying to hear something and he checked his rifle more than once.

  The wagon moved slowly through the eerie nightscape and David felt sleepy. He found himself nodding off, lulled by the rocking motion of his horse and the steady rhythm and plod of hooves on the wagon track. He managed to wake himself before he fell from his horse and he rubbed his eyes and patted his cheeks to stay awake.

  Each time he looked up at the stars, they seemed to have moved only slightly and he realized he could not measure time at night. He looked at the wagon and saw that some of the Negroes were sleeping. But the big man, Socrates, was wide awake and he was watching the stars as if he were reading a map.

  38

  MARTIN SAW ALL that he needed to see after he and the other three men reached the Rocking A. From a distance, and on foot
, they observed the loading of the wagon, were able to count and verify the number of Negroes being transported north. Before the wagon left, Martin slipped away with the two nighthawks and Roy to the place where they had hobbled their horses.

  “I reckon you got a plan,” Tom said to Martin.

  “First thing, let’s check our ropes, shake them out, make sure they’re limber.”

  “Our ropes?” Tom asked.

  “We’ll need them,” Martin said, and set the example for them when he unlashed his lariat and built a loop, making it ever wider until he threw it. It landed flat as a pancake.

  He watched as the others plied their ropes in the gathering dark. Satisfied, he told them to tie their ropes back on their saddles. When he was finished, he climbed onto his horse.

  He rode to a place where they could see the wagon depart, count the men going along on the expedition.

  Martin recognized Wilhoit and Reynaud. He did not know the Mexicans.

  “Satisfied?” Tom asked as Martin reined his horse away from their vantage point.

  “We know how many men we have to fight, if it comes to that.”

  “You aim to lasso them?” Tom asked, his voice laden with sarcasm.

  “We’ll use the ropes, Tom. Don’t worry about it.”

  “I ain’t worried about a goddamned thing, Baron.”

  “Where to?” Roy asked, mainly just to break the tension between Martin and Tom.

  “Follow me,” he said, and set a pace for the others at a slow gallop.

  “You aim to lasso them Mexes?” Cullie asked, riding up alongside Martin.

  “We might just do that, Cullie.”

  “Be awful hard in the dark and with them shootin’ at us.”

  “Now that we know what we’re facing, I think my plan will work. I put it together when we rode up here. I know a place where we ought to have the upper hand. If we do it right, nobody gets shot, nobody gets killed.”

  “I ain’t never roped no greaser before,” Cullie said.

  “And you won’t, tonight. We don’t call Mexicans that in this country.”

  “What?” Cullie asked.

  “Never mind,” Martin said.

  A few minutes later, after thinking about it, Cullie said, “Oh.” Martin smiled briefly in the dark.

  After riding a good fifteen minutes, Martin led the others back to a place near the road that offered concealment. He reined up in a copse of trees that afforded them a view of the road from a distance.

  “Don’t make any noise,” Martin warned the others.

  “How come we’re stoppin’ here?” Tom asked.

  “Let’s see how they bunch up,” Martin said. “Who’s riding where in front of and around that wagonload of Negroes.”

  “And, then?”

  “I know a place up ahead where we stand a good chance of catching them by surprise.”

  “Yeah?”

  “We passed it on the way here. No reason you should have noticed it. But, I was looking for just such a place.”

  “You knew they’d come this way,” Tom said.

  “Easiest way north from the Rocking A. If they mean to sell their stolen slaves they have to go north to a market.”

  “Makes sense.”

  “It’s about all that does,” Martin said.

  After a while, the small slave caravan rumbled past them. Martin made out a man in the lead, the driver, two flankers and a man riding drag. He could not tell who they were, but he thought he could figure it out.

  After the wagon passed, Martin turned his horse and rode well away from the road at a slow pace so that they would not make noise that could be heard from the road above the clatter of the wagon.

  “Now what do you know?” Tom asked as Martin picked up the pace, riding a parallel course to the road.

  “I figure one of the Mexicans is leading the way. One who knows the road. They’ve got two flankers and a man riding drag. I reckon they’ll change off just to keep from getting bored or stay sharp.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Well, Reynaud would ride drag for a while. The lead Mexican might switch places with one of the flankers. That leaves Wilhoit as a flanker, and he could switch off with Reynaud. I don’t figure either of the Mexicans to bring up the rear.”

  “What about the driver?”

  “He might change off, but it doesn’t change much if he does.”

  “So, what do you figure to do? There’s four of us and five of them.”

  “I’m thinking on it,” Martin said.

  “That sure does give me a lot of confidence.”

  “I thought it might.”

  Martin slowed his horse again to rest their mounts. Finally, he stopped. The others reined up with a kind of obedience that granted Martin the leadership he needed. The three men looked at him, waiting for him to speak.

  “Roy, I’ve got a job for you. After I tell you what it is, you tell me if you can do it.”

  “Why, sure, Martin.”

  “I want you to ride down alongside that road, keep up with the wagon, but keep yourself out of sight. Think you can do that?”

  “I think so.”

  “You can’t let them know we’re here.”

  “I savvy.”

  “Ride along for a half hour or so, then gradually drift off until you’re out of earshot and then come catch up with us. Don’t spare the leather. We haven’t got far to go before we have to make our move.”

  “What if I can’t find you?”

  “Remember the road. We’ll keep the same distance we’re at now. You won’t be able to miss us. Can you figure out thirty minutes of time?”

  “I’m pretty good at time,” Roy said.

  “Watch what they do. When they change positions. See if they look nervous. But, don’t get too close.”

  “I won’t.”

  “Go on, then,” Martin said.

  Roy turned his horse and rode back toward the road. The land there was crisscrossed with arroyos, shallow gullies, worn out of the land over time by flash floods. It was broken country, thick with trees and grass.

  Martin kicked his horse and rode on, followed by Tom and Cullie.

  “You trust that youngster?” Tom asked after a few moments.

  “He’ll do.”

  “Mighty young to do a man’s job.”

  “He’s grown about as much as he’s going to. He’s about the same age as my boy, and they’ve crossed some of the same rivers. You just worry about yourself, Tom.”

  “I’d hate like hell to catch a ball in the back if Roy spoils the cider.”

  “You’ve got a right sharp imagination, Tom.”

  They heard coyotes in the distance, baying at the moonrise, flinging bright lyrical ribbons to the sky that was haunting, beautiful in the stillness of the night. Martin smiled. The coyotes’ songs were part of the reason he loved that country, why he felt at home in the brush, why he loved the night, the peace it brought him.

  “I’ve had my leg pissed on before,” Tom said.

  Martin picked up the pace once more, setting his horse to a gallop. Tom and Cullie had to slap leather to catch up and by the time Martin slowed again, all three horses were blowing. Martin halted, dismounted. “We’ll walk ’em down,” he said.

  The other two men, without grumbling, slipped from their saddles and walked on wobbly heels behind Martin in single file and the coyotes stopped. singing and the stars shifted in the diamond-strewn sky. Martin ticked off time in his mind, took long strides as if he knew every inch of ground and how long it would take Roy to catch up with them once he had finished his reconnoitering.

  Roy heard the wagon coming long before he saw it, and he backed his horse into the shadows and stationed him behind enough mesquite to make him invisible. He held his breath as the caravan came into view and when he saw the lead rider, he knew it was a Mexican by the red bandanna around his neck and the straw hat he wore. As the wagon passed him by, he saw David Wilhoit and his teeth ground down tight as his
jaw stiffened.

  On the other side of the wagon was a man he did not know. He figured that must be Reynaud, and then he knew the other Mexican outrider was riding drag. He let the wagon pass by before he turned his horse and rode away from the road at an angle, moving very slowly. It was then that his horse paused for just a slash of a second and broke wind. Roy reined up and cursed silently. The noise had sounded like a thunderclap in his ears. He listened to see if the wagon would stop. Any minute he expected to hear riders crashing through the brush, coming after him.

  The wagon did stop and Roy held fast, keeping his horse in check as he listened for any signs that the outriders were going to look for him. It seemed to him that hours passed. He heard the faint rasp of voices, snatches of garbled talk that he could not decipher, and then, at last, the wagon started rolling again.

  Roy breathed a sigh of relief and waited several more moments just to make sure they had not sent one of the Mexicans out into the mesquite to look for him. He almost wished that it might be David who would come after him.

  He sat there, fingering the trigger on his rifle, pressing his thumb down lightly on the hammer so he’d be ready to cock it back as he drew it from the leather scabbard tucked under his right leg. He touched the butt of his pistol, too, rubbing the cherrywood grip, feeling the brass rivet, the metal strap.

  When it was quiet again, Roy set his horse to leave that place, angling away on a path that would take him back to the course Martin and the other two men had taken. He rode through the trees, keeping his bearings in mind and when he neared the track he thought they were on, he leaned over and studied the ground as the horse carried him northward.

  Roy carried with him confused thoughts dredged up from deep in his mind by the sight of David Wilhoit, the man who had taken his mother away from him. He wondered now if he would have had the courage to shoot Wilhoit if the man had come after him. He wondered if he would have been able to kill him and still face his mother. These were terrible thoughts that he wrestled with and tried to shut out, but he could not subdue them in the darkness of night. They were like the thoughts that came to him when he was about to fall asleep and would not go away until his eyelids got so heavy they closed and let the images drift away on waves of sleep.