Bannerman the Enforcer 16

by Kirk Hamilton

  Yancey shrugged “You know how the Mex Government is just now. Dukes is adamant that the Rangers follow his orders.” Cato cussed. “The army, too?”

  “Hell, yeah! Looks like we’ll have to jump ’em when they come back to American soil.”

  “Then you’ve got the problem of explaining away how come a bunch of gringos got to steal that gold. The Mexicans’ll figure it was gringos who held up the bullion train in the first place and Dukes has got trouble,”

  “Way I see it, main thing is to get that gold and hand it back to the Mex Government. So let’s get it first and Dukes can figure out the diplomatic approach later.”

  Cato nodded. “Guess you’re right.” But he sounded worried. “Yancey, you better vamoose. I don’t feel real easy about this. They don’t suspect anythin’ yet, figure me for a mercenary like the others. But if you’re seen they’ll recognize you from Austin, even with that beard.”

  Yancey nodded and thrust out his right hand, gripping briefly with Cato. “You want me to leave you a gun?”

  Cato considered the offer briefly, shook his head. “Nope. Wouldn’t want ’em to find anythin’ like that and get suspicious. I still got my belt-buckle knife. Good luck, Yance. Wish I could help you with findin’ your way out of this brasada.”

  “I’ll manage it.” Yancey grinned and hesitated briefly before moving to the door. “Adios, amigo. See you in Uvalde.”

  “It’s a deal,” Cato said and his teeth flashed briefly as Yancey slipped out into the passage and put the peg back through the chain holding the door closed. He eased his gun out of leather and padded back to the stairs past the doors of the other rooms. He went down cautiously to the lower floor and crossed the parlor to the hall that led to the front door.

  Yancey raised the latch cautiously. The door opened inwards and he stepped back a little so the door could swing fully and then stepped out onto the porch, gun ready. He stood perfectly still, looking around him, seeing that the porch was empty. There were many shadows in the yard: anyone or anything could be hiding there. Yancey closed the door after him and locked it again. With a little luck, he might even be able to slip the key back into the guard’s pocket. It looked as if he hadn’t come round yet.

  Yancey moved slowly along the porch and dropped off the end, crouching down to see where the unconscious guard was ... or should have been! For the man was gone and for a brief moment he thought he must have the wrong place, even the wrong end of the porch, but he knew he hadn’t made any mistake.

  Yancey dropped flat at the instant the thought formed and, almost at once a gun roared out of the darkness and splinters flew from the edge of the porch. He rolled under, triggering wildly, squirming around onto his belly as other guns out there in the yard roared and lead ripped into the floorboards above his head. He knew he had made a mistake going under the porch: they could pin him down too easily here.

  As lead thudded all around him and sent splinters flying from the woodwork, Yancey rolled out into the yard, shooting across his body as fast as he could work hammer and trigger, rolling all the time. His gun was empty when he skidded behind a rain butt, got to his feet and lunged for the deeper darkness of the brush behind the square building. As he ran, Yancey thumbed cartridges out of his belt and shook out the used shells from his gun’s cylinder. He had practiced this in total darkness for weeks before he had mastered the technique of loading by feel on the run and more than once it had saved his life. By the time he reached the brush, he had the Peacemaker loaded again and lead was singing around him, ripping through branches, zipping into the ground his pounding boots passed over.

  He hurled himself headlong the last few feet, crashed into the brush and rolled, tucking his legs up and then snapping them straight to thrust himself up from the ground. He heard bullets whipping into the brush and fired a shot, immediately diving to the left. Panting, he crouched low as the guns out there stuttered again and then he edged back into the blackness of the thicker brush, hoping their gunfire would cover the sounds of his passage. He had planned his escape route before coming in earlier and he moved along this route by instinct now, towards where he had left the gray tethered to a tree.

  There were shouts and the odd gunshot back there in the yard and he could hear someone beating the brush, looking for him. Then he saw the outline of the patient gray under the tree and sprinted for it, holstering his Peacemaker as he made a leap for the stirrup.

  Then there was a movement on his left and his right hand drove down towards the gun butt but he couldn’t stop his forward and upward movement Then the shape cannoned into him and knocked him sprawling, the breath gusting from him.

  He started to get to his feet, instinctively groping for his gun butt, and then a rifle butt slammed into his stomach and knocked him down again. The butt clipped him across the temple, and bright lights exploded in his head and, as he fell towards unconsciousness, he heard Storm’s voice calling.

  “I’ve got him! I’ve got him!”

  Eight – A Way Out

  Yancey came to his senses in the main house and he was lying on the floor on a jaguar skin, his head throbbing, jaw and ribs feeling as if a herd of buffalo had walked over them. He looked around in the amber light of several oil lamps and saw four men, two shotgun guards, Storm, and a tall, lean man in embroidered and padded smoking jacket whom he guessed was Duke Early.

  The tall man looked coldly down at Yancey, smoking a cigar slowly. He sprinkled hot ash down into Yancey’s face and the Enforcer jerked his head back and brushed it from his eyes. Early smiled crookedly.

  “Who are you?” he asked, amused about something.

  “Name’s Jim Banner.” Yancey sat up slowly, carefully, seeing the shotgun guards tense. Storm stared at him bleakly. He didn’t have a gun in his hand. “I was on my way out here with your man, O’Hara, but he didn’t trust me, made some sort of signal to your guard and there was a shootout. I killed ’em both.”

  He figured that if he told most of the truth it would stand him in better stead than a whole pack of lies. What bothered him most was Storm. He didn’t know how good a look at him the ramrod had gotten back in Austin when he had ridden in, shooting, as they were making off with Cato. But, for now, he had to play along with the story about being an illegal arms dealer he had invented back in Santa Rosa.

  He told Early that he had some guns he might be interested in and Early merely looked at him with narrowed eyes.

  “Perhaps it’s true,” he said slowly. “Perhaps not. Doesn’t matter much, Banner. How did you find this place and, what’s more important, how did you get past the guard at the gate?”

  “He was likely on the peyote again, Duke,” Storm said but fell silent at a savage look from Early.

  “If he was, he’ll die for it!” Early gritted, then snapped at Yancey. “Well? I’m waiting!”

  Yancey shrugged, rubbing at his swollen temple. “I turned O’Hara’s hoss loose and followed it here. Slipped around your guard and climbed through your fence.”

  “You’re lying, of course,” Early said smoothly. “Your horse couldn’t slip through the fence, Banner! Don’t take me for a fool, man, or you’ll wish you hadn’t!” He leaned down closer, lips pulled back around his teeth. “If you annoy me too much, my friend, I’ll have you staked out in a rattlesnake thicket I know of not far from here. You understand me?”

  “I savvy you,” Yancey said tightly. “Okay, your guard was sleeping, or drugged or something. I took the key, opened the gate, then locked it behind me. I saw armed guards and men practicing with guns and I figured maybe this was too tough a place for me. So I laid low till it was dark to try and slip out.”

  “That building you were coming out of wasn’t the way out, mister!” Storm gritted.

  “I was hungry,” Yancey lied. “Figured to get me some grub before takin’ off. I don’t know my way around this brasada and ...”

  Storm suddenly gave an exclamation, snapped his fingers, moved in and grabbed Yancey’s hair. He ya
nked his head back so that the lantern light washed fully across his features. He twisted Yancey’s head this way and that, turned to the puzzled Early.

  “Hell, I know this hombre, Duke!” he snapped. “His beard threw me for a spell, but he’s the one who rode in and started shootin’ when we moved in on Cato. See? Here’s the scar across his scalp where my lead creased him!”

  Early’s mouth tightened and he stared coldly down at the silent Yancey. “This puts a different light on things.” He turned his bleak gaze onto Storm. “And how come he was able to follow you down here from Austin?”

  Storm swallowed. “Hell, Duke, I dunno. I just don’t get it at all. We covered our tracks ...”

  “Not well enough, it seems.” He nudged Yancey with a polished boot toe. “How did you do it, Banner? You must have had help. But our friend Cato isn’t that important, surely. We checked him out and he seems to be just a chancer who’s keen to make twenty thousand dollars.”

  “Mebbe, but he’s my pard,” Yancey said, figuring he had to change his story now. “We’ve been through a lot together and he’s saved my life a few times. I figured I owed it to him to make sure he was all right. But maybe I can get a crack at this twenty thousand you’re talking about, too, huh? Sounds fine to me!”

  “I don’t like this, Duke,” Storm said. “Somethin’ loco here. I reckon he was in that building to see Cato. Yet he was comin’ out alone—”

  “Strange indeed,” Early said, not taking his eyes off Yancey.

  “Like you said, Cato’s interested in gettin’ his twenty thousand bucks,” Yancey told him, “Couldn’t talk him into coming with me ... long as he was all right, I figured to mosey and we’d arranged to meet in San Antonio after he’d done whatever job you want him to do.”

  “He could be a lawman, Duke,” Storm snapped. “Undercover man. Got his information from Cato and was headin’ out to the Rangers. We better kill him to make sure. Cato, too.”

  Early held up a hand. “Get Cato.”

  Storm arched his eyebrows and then nodded to one of the shotgun guards. The man went out and returned about ten minutes later with Cato. The small agent looked at Yancey and swiftly assessed the situation.

  “Hell, at least you’re alive!” he said to Yancey. “Heard all that ruckus you started and figured they must’ve killed you! Why didn’t you go to the Duke like I suggested and ask him if you could get in on the deal, ’stead of tryin’ to bust out?”

  Yancey shrugged. “Don’t like bein’ around snakes. Of any kind. Not even for twenty thousand.”

  “Hell, I’m sorry about this, Duke,” Cato said to Early. “But we’ve been pards a long time, him and me, and he figured he was doin’ right by comin’ in here after me, thought I was in trouble because of the way Storm grabbed me in Austin. He’s a damn fine man with a gun and we could sure use him when we move in on Uvalde ...”

  “Shut your mouth!” snapped Early savagely, his eyes blazing. “Storm has suggested that your friend is an undercover Ranger, taking details of our little venture back to the nearest outpost. What’ve you got to say to that, Cato?”

  “He’s loco,” Cato snapped, glaring at Storm. “I tell you he’s my pard. That’s all. I’m almighty grateful to him for comin’ after me, but the Rangers are the last ones he’d be workin’ for. He’s on their wanted list.”

  Early smoked down his cigar and then strolled across the room and flicked the butt into the fireplace. He turned to face the others, a hand grasping his chin as he stared down at Yancey. He moved his cold eyes to Cato.

  “I think we’ll keep your friend here, Cato. I can’t afford to lose any guns right now. We’re moving out tomorrow. So, whether you’re a lawman, Cato, or who you claim to be, you’ll do exactly as I say or your friend will die a horrible death out in the snake thickets.” He smiled crookedly.

  Cato flicked his gaze to Yancey, who stared back and shrugged: they had to play this as it came, or the whole deal would be shot to pieces.

  “No need for that, Duke,” Cato said, “I told you, I want that twenty thousand. And Yancey’s a good man You’d be glad of his gun.”

  “‘Yancey’? He said his name was Jim Banner.”

  Cato said blandly, “He’s had plenty of names. What’s a name matter?”

  Early shrugged. “Whatever he’s called doesn’t matter now. Storm, lock him up in the Box.”

  ‘The Box’, as Cato knew, was a sheet-tin shed with an iron grille door and window, barely large enough for a man to sit down in with his knees tucked up under his chin. It was only five feet high so a man as tall as Yancey would have no hope of ever standing upright. The Box was in the center of a bare yard near the target range and Duke Early used it to ‘discipline’ such of his Mexican servants as had failed to please him in some way.

  “Hell, Duke, I still think we should kill him now!” Storm said. “Cato, too. He ain’t all that damn good!”

  “Do as you’re told!” roared Early, eyes blazing. He rounded on Cato. “And you will do as you’re told, mister. Or you’ll know the consequences!”

  “Sure,” Cato said slowly. “But I sure wish you’d let him show you what he can do. He’s faster’n me.”

  Early hesitated momentarily, then shook his head. “My mind is made up.” He turned abruptly and walked out of the room.

  A shotgun guard rammed his gun barrel against Cato’s back and jerked a head towards the door. Cato sighed and moved away slowly.

  “Sorry, pard,” he said quietly to Yancey.

  “You just follow orders and come back and get me out of this Box thing he was talkin’ about,” Yancey said.

  Cato nodded and went out at the impatient prodding of the guard. Storm hauled Yancey to his feet and shoved him towards another door which was being held open by the second shotgun guard. Yancey, stumbling a little, went through it and out once more into the night.

  Even this early in the morning, the iron walls of the Box were too hot to touch and Yancey could feel their heat through his shirt where his shoulders touched them. He was too broad to turn any way that would keep all parts of his body from touching the walls and his clothes were drenched with sweat.

  Through the bars of the door he had seen Duke Early’s cavalcade leave the Broken-T on the first part of its journey down to Uvalde. Early was riding at the head of the line of armed men, dressed entirely in black with a few silver conchos dotting his trousers belt. He wore two six-guns with ivory handles, carved in the design of the American Eagle and issued in limited edition by Colt’s Connecticut factory. They must have cost plenty, Yancey figured, or maybe they had been stolen from some luckless traveler killed by Early himself or his men. He forked a big black horse and lifted a hand encased in a black leather glove in mock salute towards the Box.

  Yancey had seen Cato’s worried face as he rode out, but he remained silent and still. There was nothing either of them could do right now.

  Three covered wagons accompanied Early’s gunfighters and he had more armed men inside. Yancey guessed that the Mexicans would figure the guns they thought they were buying would be in those wagons. Well, there would be guns, all right, but they would be spitting fire and death.

  After they had gone, there was silence for a spell, then some of the Mexican ranch hands began moving about their chores and went riding out to the range, for Early ran a herd on his land and work had to be done. A shy young Mexican girl brought him a bowl of chili and some cornpone and coffee. She left a clay pitcher of water where he could reach it through the bars but would not speak to him or answer any of his questions. As soon as she had left the things, she ran back to the house.

  Yancey tried to ease his cramped body and felt the heat begin to pulse like a living thing as it enveloped him. Heat exhaustion would kill him. Duke Early likely knew this but Cato might not realize it was so bad in the Box and he would figure if he followed orders and came out of the raid alive, he would ride back to find Yancey alive, maybe uncomfortable and cramped and sick, but alive. Yancey re
alized that Early had no intention of keeping Cato alive after his usefulness was past. Likely he would have something planned for all the gunfighters so he could keep the hundred thousand in gold that he had promised them. The man was insane, no doubt about that.

  The yard was spinning, going in and out of focus and his hands shook badly as he reached for the clay pitcher of water and brought it to his lips through the bars. The iron was hot against his face as he gulped the warm liquid and he was surprised to find that the pitcher was almost empty. He hadn’t realized he had drunk so much.

  It must be approaching noon now, for the sun blazed down like a white hot metal disc and steam was rising from his sweat-saturated clothes, leaving faint smudges of white salt where they dried. His head rocked loosely on his neck as he tried to fight sleep. His head was splitting, throbbing, the pain pulsing behind his eyes. Even when he closed them he could still see patterns of red and white and the glare was unrelenting. His head slid forward and his face pressed against the hot iron bars of the door but he was too weak to move. He moaned feebly and then …

  Yancey gasped as icy cold water was dashed over him and he sat back so fast that the back of his head banged on the iron wall with a drumming sound. He squinted through the water coursing down his face, had a brief glimpse of someone standing in front of the door, and then was hit by a second bucket of ice-cold well water. When he could see again and his breathing had settled, he blinked against the glare and frowned as he squinted at the person standing there.

  “Who is it? You’re standing against the sun.”

  “It’s Jeannie,” the woman said and there was apprehension in her voice, urgency. “Are you out of it now? Fully awake?”

  “Yeah, sure, but I ...”

  “Listen, you’ve got to make a decision if you want me to help you. A fast decision! You hear me?”

  “Sure, sure,” he said, getting a hand up against the glare, looking between slitted fingers and making her out now. She was wearing a riding outfit and he could see his gunrig on the ground beside her. She held something that glinted in her right hand. He heard her say: