by Ralph Cotton
“I hate a smart son of a bitch like this Summers fellow,” Dad said, reaching a finger out and flipping the hanging tip of the buggy whip. “This is one of the oldest tricks in the book, and damned if we didn’t fall for it.”
“Not we, Dad, you,” said Darren. “I tried to tell you we never should have taken this trail. The Mex won’t use it, haven’t for a long time. They say it’s haunted by the spirits of dead Apache.”
“Listen, fool,” Dad said. “I’m not a Mex. I don’t believe in Apache ghosts, nor does any white man with enough sense to lift a bucket handle. If you do, you’d do well to at least keep your mouth shut about it.”
“I never said I believe it,” said Darren. “I said the Mex do.” He looked around at the other men, ten of them, dust-covered and tired from chasing an empty hay wagon.
Dad shook his head and growled a curse under his breath. Then he looked around until he saw Hico Morales.
“Hico, get me a driver up here,” he said. “We chased this damn rig down. I’m going to get some use out of it.”
Hico looked at Lajo sitting on his horse beside him.
“You heard him, Lajo,” Hico said. “Tie your horse to the tailgate and drive the hay wagon.”
“Where are we headed now?” Darren asked his father as Lajo rode his horse to the rear of the wagon and jumped down from his saddle.
“We’re headed for the Swann spread,” said Dad. “That’s where Summers and Little Ted are headed. They didn’t get themselves more than a two- or three-hour start on us, the way I figure it. If we ride hard we’ll make that up in no time.”
“Our horses are tired and need resting, Dad,” Hico said, sounding reluctant.
“There’s water, damn it, Hico. Water them,” Dad said, pointing at the small water hole. “They can rest while they drink their fill. The longer I put off dealing with the Swanns, the worse things seem to get. We’ve got a big wagon. We might as well fill it. There’re lots of valuables there, if Rizale and Tate haven’t gotten it all and cut out with it. Those sons a’ bitches.”
Hico and the men dropped from their saddles and led their horses to the edge of the water hole and let them drink. Lajo took the buggy whip down and pitched it in the empty wagon bed. He turned the wagon around and waited until the other horses were watered and the men had stepped up into their saddles. He waited for Dad’s signal until the men filed past him and Dad waved him out to follow behind them.
At the front of the men, Darren and Tubbs rode along side by side. When Dad rode up to the head of the column, Tubbs pulled away and rode next to Red Warren and Buster Saggert.
“You look like you’re ’bout dead, Tubbs,” Red Warren said. He nodded at the bandage behind Tubbs’ shirt. The wide, dark bloodstain covered half his chest where the blood had seeped through.
“Don’t worry about me,” Tubbs said haughtily. “I’ve got something here waiting for that horse trader and the two ranch hands soon as we get there.”
They rode on, with Dad signaling them to boot their horses into a gallop to make up for lost time.
Three hours later the riders arrived at the Swann spread, stopping out of sight below the far side of the low rise. Dad waved them around him. All of them bunched up in front of the wagon.
“I’ve already told the lot of yas, we’ve got a right to anything we take from the Swanns. When a man owes the kind of money Ansil Swann owes Finnity and Baines, folks like us have a right and an obligation to take everything he’s got to make up for it. If his assets come to more than it costs to seize and sell them, anything left over goes to us for our trouble of having to hunt him down.”
“Don’t forget,” Darren put in, “the law on the other side of the border might not read that way, but this is Mexico and we can do as we damn please—”
“Who the hell asked you to open your idiot mouth?” Dad said, cutting Darren off with a strange, bemused expression.
“Sorry, Dad,” Darren said. “I just felt like I ought to say something about it, that’s all.”
“Jesus,” Dad said under his breath. He looked around, then motioned the men toward the crest of the low rise. “All right, follow me,” he said. “We’re riding in slow. If they turn tail and run, all the better for us. It’ll keep the valuables from getting busted up.” He grinned. “And don’t forget, there’s nothing says we can’t shoot them in their backs while they’re leaving.”
• • •
In the Swann hacienda, Summers, Rena, Bailey and the two ranch hands stood inside Ansil Swann’s office. Ansil sat slumped in his wheelchair, his expression the same as it had been ever since Summers arrived with the bay fillies. The broken engraved Colt still lay in the same spot, its hammer cocked. The gunmen who had been there hadn’t even bothered stealing the worthless gun. Ansil’s bourbon had been more important to them.
Atop the desk lay the two large packs of cash that had come from the safe inside the sealed mine shaft, each with the large dollar sign on them. Bailey stood with her hand atop the packs, Lonnie Kerns’ cut of the proceeds stacked beside them.
“This takes care of everybody,” Bailey said coolly. “I thank all of you. And now it’s time for me to go to Mexico City and make sure this promissory note from Don Manuel gets properly cashed and deposited.”
“Wait a minute,” Summers said. “What about Ansil? Who’s going to take care of him while you’re gone?”
Bailey looked for a second as if she’d completely forgotten about her husband sitting there. But then she recovered quickly and turned to Rena.
“Actually,” she said, “I had hoped Rena would stay here awhile longer, take care of him until I get back. I can see you are feeling much better, eh? Aren’t you, darling?”
Rena shook her head.
“I’m leaving,” she said bluntly.
“Leaving? Don’t be silly, Rena,” Bailey said. “You have no family now. There’s no one to go home to in Guatemala—your humble little village.” She smiled condescendingly. “Where on earth will you go, dear?”
“I’m going with Will,” Rena said boldly. “He has invited me to join him and go to . . . Wind River?” She posed it as a question.
Summers looked surprised, but he too played it off quickly.
“Yes, Wind River,” he said. He looked from Rena to Bailey. “We’re leaving right away.”
“Well, well, Mr. Summers,” Bailey said in a half-piqued tone. “I can see that nothing slows you down for long, does it?”
“No, ma’am,” Summers said. He passed Rena the trace of a smile. “I know good fortune when it comes knocking.”
Rena returned his smile; she blushed a little.
“I kept that thought, like I promised,” she said.
“Yes, you did,” Summers said, “and you must have read my mind while you were at it.”
Bailey stood staring rigidly.
“How wonderful,” she said, oozing sarcasm.
“So,” Rena said, ignoring her attitude, “if you will be so kind as to give me my, and my father’s, wages for the past seven months . . .” She let her words trail.
“Well, Rena, really . . . ,” Bailey said, caught off guard. “You can’t just expect me to come up with the money all at once like this.”
Rena looked at the bag of cash on the desk; so did Summers and the two ranch hands.
“You said with Don Manuel’s bank draft you have enough to pay off Finnity and Baines and take care of the ranch and some other investments,” Summers said quietly.
“Well, I do,” said Bailey, “but I won’t have, if I fritter it all away.”
“It’s her and her father’s money. Pay her,” Summers insisted.
“Hold everything, all of you!” Lonnie said, having stepped quickly over to the gun port and gazed out. “Look there, coming over the rise.”
Summers and Little Ted stepped over to the w
indow and looked out with him.
“Looks like they’ve come to collect what they think is due to them,” Summers said. “They’re riding in slow, hoping we’ll make a run for it. If we do, we’ll be dead before we leave the yard.”
The two ranch hands looked at him and stood in silence.
He said over his shoulder to Bailey Swann, “How much money is still in the packs, ma’am? It looks like we’ll need it to keep them from pounding us into the ground.”
“I’m not giving the money to them,” Bailey said with resolve. “It’s that simple. I’ll need it to travel on to Mexico City.”
“There looks to be a dozen or more,” Summers said. “You tell me how you plan on all of us getting out of this alive.”
“I don’t know, but I’m not giving them the money,” she said. “Even if I did, what’s going to keep them from killing us and not even telling Finnity and Baines about this cash?”
“We are,” Summers said, “the three of us.” He looked at Lonnie and Ted Ford. “Us three and these gun ports,” he added, nodding toward the windows. “That’s all that’s kept this place from falling a long time ago.” He picked up one of the packs from the desk and slung it up over his arm. “Take the other one, Bailey,” he said, nodding at the other pack. “You’d better hide it somewhere good and safe. If they catch you holding out on them, they’ll take the money and kill you for good measure.”
Chapter 25
Fifty yards from the hacienda, Dad brought his men to a halt. The hay wagon squeaked up beside him and jolted to a halt as Lajo struggled with the unfamiliar brake handle. Dad gave him a harsh look, then turned his eyes back to the upper windows of the hacienda, its gun ports looking ancient and fortress strong in the afternoon sunlight. Darren rode up beside his father, his horse restless, eager to break into a run at the slightest tap of a heel.
“Why are we stopped, Dad?” he asked, a sawed-off shotgun hanging in his hand, his face still smarting from the buckshot the doctor had removed.
“Something’s wrong,” Dad said, staring straight ahead. “They should be lighting out by now.”
Darren’s horse spun another full turn before he got it checked down.
“Wrong, hell! It looks perfect to me,” he said, holding his reins back tight with his free hand. Still the horse jumped up and down in place on its front hooves. “I’m ready as hell to blast that horse trader with both barrels—show him us Crayleys give back as good as we get.”
Dad looked at Hico and Red Warren on his other side, and gave them a look. Then he turned to his son.
“If you don’t get that horse under hand,” he said, “I’m going bend that shotgun barrel over your back.”
“The hell did I do?” shouted Darren.
Dad didn’t answer. He straightened in his saddle as he saw Will Summers step out onto the front porch.
“Speak of the devil . . . ,” he murmured to himself.
“Who did?” asked Darren. He looked all around as if someone might admit to it.
“Please, shut up!” Dad barked at him. He squinted toward the porch, seeing Summers wave a white pillowcase tied to the end of a double-barreled shotgun. In Summers’ other hand, Dad saw the canvas backpack.
“What is this?” Hico asked Dad.
“I don’t know,” said Dad. “You still got your army glass?”
“Oh yeah,” said Hico. He reached back inside his saddlebags, fished out a battered telescope and handed it to Dad.
Dad spat on the front end of it and wiped it on his shirtsleeve. He stretched it out and held it to his eye.
Hico watched a thin smile come to Dad’s face as Dad saw the large dollar sign on the canvas pack.
“Now, I like that a lot,” Dad said.
“What is it?” Hico asked.
“It’s money, Hico,” said Dad. “How much, who knows?” he added with a dark chuckle. “But the horse trader is starting to talk my language. He’s got a bag that has a big ol’ dollar sign right on the side of it.”
“Hold it, Dad,” said Darren. “You ain’t about to let him buy his way out of this, are you?”
Dad grinned, still looking through the long scope.
“Out of what?” he said. “The longer I look at that dollar sign, the more I forget why we’re mad at him.”
“Not letting him buy his way out of shooting me, damn it—that’s what!” Darren shouted.
“Aw, yeah, that’s right,” Dad said, goading his angry son. He raised a hand for the men behind to see, and moved it forward slowly. “Easy-like, boys,” he said to them without looking around. “It looks like we’ve got us a talker here. Let’s go down slow and calm, hear what the man’s got to say.”
“You mean we’re not going to kill him?” Darren asked in disbelief.
“That all depends,” said Dad. “Thomas Finnity is headed this way. Might be here tomorrow. It would be sweet as Sunday pie if I could throw a bag of money at his feet, tell him we collected a big payment from Ansil Swann.”
“Well, I’ll be dipped in shit!” Darren said in disgust, raising his voice.
“Yes, you might very well be,” Dad said menacingly, “if you don’t shut your damn mouth.”
• • •
On the porch, Summers lowered the canvas bag and held it in his hand as the riders brought their horses into the front yard at a walk. The wagon followed close behind them. Dad rode at the center of a V formation. When he stopped twenty feet from the front porch, the V turned into a half circle, enclosing the front of the hacienda. One of the men started to move away and go around to the rear of the house, but a nod from Dad stopped him. There was no need to watch the rear door. This place truly was a fortress; these people weren’t going to try to make a run for it.
Dad gave a pensive grin and raised a finger and shook it a little as he stared at Summers and the canvas pack.
“You know, I could have flushed all of you out of here if I really wanted to. Sooner or later you’d get hungry, thirsty or your own stink starts getting to you. Am I right?” He spread his hands, affably, the grin still in place.
Summers didn’t answer. He wasn’t about to reveal how many provisions they had laid up inside for a siege.
“Here’s enough money to hold off Finnity and Baines until the Swanns can get to Mexico City,” he said, gesturing toward the pack in his hand. “Then they’ll pay up the rest.” The shotgun was still half-raised in his other hand. The pillowcase fluttered slightly on a hot breeze.
“Oh?” said Dad, realizing Summers was too smart to tell him anything he didn’t have to. “What happens when they get to Mexico City?”
“They’ll be making a deposit large enough to clear all outstanding accounts with Finnity and Baines,” he said.
Dad gave him a curious look.
“Are you some kind of attorney, as well as a horse trader?” he asked.
“No,” Summers said, “I’m just a horse trader. I got caught in the middle of this, and I’ve had to scratch my way out.” He held the canvas pack forward a little. “There’s the deal. What do you say to it?”
“How much is in there?” Dad asked, nodding at the pack.
“I never speculate on money I haven’t counted,” Summers said. He hefted the bag up and down. “Weightwise I’m going to say seventy pounds, give or take.”
“That is a chunk of money, sure enough,” Dad said, his eyes lighting up a little as he imagined how good it would look, him handing the pack over to Thomas Finnity. “But you have caused an awful lot of trouble since you sprang onto everybody’s path. It’d be almost a shame not to kill you.”
“I didn’t spring onto anybody’s path,” Summers said. “I came here to deliver some horses. When I seek to do something I get it done. That’s the business I’m in. Who would want to deal with a horse trader who can’t deliver what he says he’ll—”
; “All right, all right, I understand all that,” Dad said, cutting him off with a raised hand. “You’re proposing we take the money and just leave? Leave the wagon sitting empty?”
“That’s right,” Summers said. “Take the money to your employers and tell them the rest is coming real soon. If it doesn’t, they can take up right here where we left off. Deal?” He let the pack fall from his hand and took a cautious step back away from it.
Dad just stared at him for a moment. Darren sat fuming in his saddle.
“A horse trader, huh?” Dad said, curious as to Summers’ youth and savvy in handling himself. “You look young. How long you been at it?”
“A year . . . a little over,” Summers said.
“You make the auctions, travel the trade circuit, I suppose?” Dad asked.
“That’s part of it,” Summers said.
“Damn it to hell, Dad?” Darren shouted with a dark, bemused look on his face. “You two want coffee? Maybe sit and visit awhile?” His face boiled red. “The son of a bitch shot me—have you heard?”
“Damn it, fool, that’s all I’ve heard!” Dad shouted back, so loud and fierce that all the men seemed to cower a little.
Summers stood poised for anything in the tense following silence. He waited for a second, then ventured, “Deal?” again, to Dad.
Dad let out a much-needed breath of relief and started to reply, but Darren would still have none of it.
“Hell no, it’s not a deal!” he shouted. Seeing his father giving in, he stepped his horse forward, the shotgun in hand, his thumb over the hammers, ready to pull them back.
“Darren, get the hell back here!” Dad shouted.
“Look at my face!” Darren shouted, his eyes flashing back and forth between his father and Will Summers. “Look what the son of a bitch done to me! Look at Tubbs, shot through the chest! That poor bastard breathes, it sounds like turkeys mating!”