Kid Rodelo (1966)

by L'amour, Louis

  Joe Harbin swore slowly, in a muffled, ugly tone.

  His cheekbones were streaks of red from the sun. His cracked lips were white with dust, as was his beard. His cruel black eyes were deep-sunken under shaggy brows. Grimly, he turned right, descended a couple of hundred feet on a long slope of sand, then started up, at an angle, another long slope.

  Twice they believed they had reached the edge of the dunes, but each time more sand hills lay beyond. Finally at sunset, from the crest of a dune, they saw the sea.

  They stood unmoving, struck dumb at the sight. The sun was setting beyond the dark mountains of Baja California, but nearer to them lay that thin streak of blue that was the Gulf.

  “We made it,” Harbin croaked. “By the Lord Harry, we made it!”

  “Not yet,” Badger replied grimly. “Look!”

  Half a mile away, riding the ridge of a dune, one … two … three … four … Four Indians, just to the north of them, and probably at the edge of the dunes.

  “I can take that many standin’ on my head,” Harbin said. “Any time!”

  “How about those?” Nora asked quietly, pointing to the south.

  Five … no, six Indians there.

  Joe Harbin looked at them. “One good drink o’ water and I’ll handle them too.”

  “Water?” Badger glanced at him. “You don’t savvy Injuns, Joe. They’ll let us get close, and then they’ll pin us down out in the open where there’s no shade, no shelter, and no chance. They’ll have water. They’ll drink, they’ll stay out of rifle shot, and they’ll wait … like buzzards, for us to die.”

  Nevertheless they moved on, wanting at any cost to get out of the sand hills.

  “We could wait at the foot of the hills,” Nora said, “find a place in the shade. It would be late afternoon before the sun got to us.”

  “And then?” Joe’s tone was sarcastic.

  The answer to that was obvious. If they waited, they would die. And if they tried for the shore, they would die.

  “Answer to that is,” Harbin muttered, replying to what Badger had said, “don’t let ourselves get pinned down. We got to keep going. If they want to set on a water hole they got to fight us for it.”

  The pack horse went down, struggled, and failed to get up. “Cut the pack loose,” Badger said, “and load the gold on thegrulla .”

  When they went on, the pack horse still lay there. But Nora knew that when the coolness of night came the horse would get up, and somehow it would get to the edge of the sea, where it would find water at one of the water holes near the shore.

  The sand hill broke off sharply and before them lay the coastal plain. Now they could feel the coolness of the Gulf, though it was five miles off at this point.

  “We better rest,” Badger muttered through broken lips. “We’d stand a better chance.”

  Dan Rodelo drank deep of the cold water at the base of the Sierra Blanca. He drank, and drank again. He removed his shirt and bathed his chest and shoulders. And all the while he was thinking hard.

  By now they might have reached the Gulf, but he thought not. Perhaps Tom Badger could have, but there was no telling about Harbin. He was impulsive, dangerous, and tyrannical. Badger would play second fiddle to Harbin, waiting for his chance.

  Seated in the cool shade of the rocks near the tank, Rodelo went to work on the battered canteen. Though a bullet had gone through it, he had an idea he might plug the holes well enough to keep some water in the canteen.

  The weblike skeletons of the cholla that he tried to use crumbled in his fingers. Nor could he do much with a piece of ironwood that he found. He had neither time nor patience to carve that very hard wood into the necessary shape. The result was that he cut from a sahuaro cactus a plug for each hole, then filled the canteen. A little water leaked, but as the cactus plug swelled, it leaked no longer.

  Carefully, he cleaned his guns, wiping each cartridge free of dust, running a rag through the barrels, checking the action then reloading.

  Finding a hidden shadowed place among the rocks, he slept again. When he awakened the sun was already high and hot. His canteen was still full; he sat on a rock and studied the way he must go.

  He was, he was sure, near the southern end of the area of great dunes, and might save time in the long run by scouting south, but he did not know how far he would have to go. After considerable thought he decided to strike out across the dunes, holding to as direct a line as possible.

  He was so close to the Sierra that he could not pick out any distinctive peak, but far up the side of the mountain he saw a white scar, apparently a deep cut made by run-off water. Choosing this as a means of holding his course, he took up his rifle, shouldered the canteen, and started off at a steady walk.

  He continued to check the white scar on the mountain, looking back and keeping it directly behind, him, but when he had gone perhaps half a mile, he chose a peak that would be even better as a guide. The first mile was the easiest, following much of the way along the high side of a dune where the sand had packed well. He made good time—not so good as a man might make on hard ground, but not much slower.

  After that it was a struggle. Soft sand that slid back, losing one step out of three. But he was familiar with shifting sand, and he chose his way with care. After about an hour of walking, he believed he had made almost two miles, and now he could smell the sea plainly.

  A moment later he heard the first shot. It seemed to come from the north, and at first he was not sure that it was a shot, yet what other sound could it be in this lonely, desolate land?

  He heard no more shots and kept on, adding half a mile to his distance. Sliding down one dune, he climbed another at an angle, and when he reached the top he lay down on the sand. It burned his flesh, but he lay there a moment, looking ahead. Then he took a long, comfortable drink, and moved on again.

  Topping out on a high pinnacle of sand that probably was the shroud for some buried granite or lava peak, he saw the sea. The blue was still far off, beautiful in the afternoon sun and the clear air. Then he spotted them, a small cluster of dark dots on the expanse of the desert.

  Between the great dunes and the shore lay flat land with good patches of galleta grass and scattered mesquite or cacti. There were patches of dry lake, bare of vegetation for the most part, and, of course, the creosote bush everywhere.

  At that distance he could not make out who was who, seeing them only as several dots in a cluster. Some distance away, on all sides, were the Yaquis. They were well back out of range, it seemed, and they were just waiting.

  Well, Hat was in no hurry. He had them now where he had wanted them all the while. He had them out on the flat land without much shelter from bullets and no shelter from the sun.

  He could afford to wait.

  Chapter Thirteen.

  After some searching, Rodelo saw a route to the flat by which he could not be seen by the Indians. He was quite sure they were not expecting him, but he dared take no chances. He got to lower ground, took a long pull on the canteen, and then chose the shallow wash by which some of the water from. Pinacate found its way to the sea.

  He walked across several yards of flat ground to get to it, hoping that the Indians, a good mile or more away, would be too occupied with their quarry to see him. Once in the shallow wash, aware that he had little cover, he started off at a brisk walk. From time to time he heard a shot.

  He knew what was happening. Hat was trying to draw fire from the surrounded group. He wanted to keep them worried, keep them from making a desperate try to break out of the trap. He also wanted them to expend their ammunition and their energy.

  Dan Rodelo knew just how much of a gamble he was taking, and how slight were his chances, but the girl he loved was out there, and the gold that would prove him an honest man. Whatever his future might be, he knew he could not face the world without proving his innocence of crime … And he wanted that girl.

  But there was something else. He had never backed away from a fight, once
the issue had been faced, the battle joined. He could not back away from this one; and this was a fight he had to win.

  He knew he was being a fool; he knew the odds were high that he was probably within a few hours, perhaps even a few minutes, of his death. He knew that even should he get Badger and Harbin out of the corner they were in, it would still mean shooting it out with them.

  He followed along the wash, where the sand was still hard packed from the last rain. He was out of sight, but he believed he was some distance away: There had been no shot in several minutes, when he rounded a corner of the wash that was masked by mesquite and found himself face to face with an Indian.

  The Yaqui wore a band around his head, and an old blood-stained army coat. He had been creeping up the bank when he heard Rodelo’s step.

  Rodelo was holding his Winchester in both hands ready for a quick shot, but the Yaqui was so close there was no chance to fire. He jerked the end of the barrel up hard, driving for the spot where chin and throat meet. The end of the barrel struck, and the Indian’s cry was caught in a gagging, choking sound, horrible to hear. He staggered back and Rodelo followed in remorselessly, giving him a wicked smash to the head with the rifle butt driven by both hands.

  The Yaqui went to the sand, and Rodelo leaned over and stripped him of his cartridge belt. He carried the second Winchester along with him.

  He saw the two Indians almost at once, fifty yards off and half hidden by the sand bank. He dropped the dead Indian’s rifle and brought up his own as the Yaquis caught sight of him. He saw them start to lift their rifles, but he was already firing.

  His first shot, a snap shot but with enough time, was a direct hit. He saw one Indian stagger a few steps, then fall. His second shot glanced off the other Indian’s rifle and went along his arm, leaving a streak behind it. The Indian dropped to one knee and fired back. Rodelo’s third and fourth shots smashed him in the chest and neck.

  Then Rodelo went up the wash at a run, carrying the extra rifle. His advantage was now gone, and from this moment it would be a hunting party, and he would be the game. How many Indians remained he did not know, but it was a safe guess to estimate it at ten or a dozen—far too many.

  In the tiny hollow behind low mesquite brush where there was only partial concealment and sparse cover, Joe Harbin crouched with his gun in hand. Badger, his shoulder carrying the bloody scratch of a bullet, was nearby.

  “What’s goin’ on out there?” Harbin muttered. “We got company.”

  “That will be Dan Rodelo,” Nora said coolly.

  Harbin looked around at her. “Like hell!” he said. “Nobody could cross that amount of country without water.”

  There was no further sound for several minutes, and then Harbin saw an Indian moving swiftly through the brush, his attention not on them, but directed toward some other object. He was a young warrior, and he had momentarily forgotten one enemy in concentrating on another. He was a very young warrior who would grow no older.

  Joe Harbin saw him drop to the ground, and waited. The Indian had made one mistake in forgetting his first enemy, and having made one mistake he might make a second and get up from the sheltered position into which he had dropped. An older warrior would have crept along the ground and then gotten up some yards from where he had hit the ground.

  The young Yaqui had been taught all that, and had done it many times in practice, but right now he forgot. Intent upon Dan Rodelo, whom he could see edging along the shallow wash, he raised up from his position slowly.

  He felt the bullet hit and went to his knees. He felt it as one feels a sharp blow in the back at the waistline. He felt no pain, nothing. Puzzled, he started to get up, and could not. Slowly he wilted to the ground, looking unbelievingly at his legs, which no longer seemed a part of him. He tried to rise again, and felt a twinge of pain. He put a careful hand around to his back and it came away bloody. He reached a second time, and his questing fingers found the hole. The bullet had smashed through his spine, and it was now lodged somewhere inside him. He lay back and looked up at the sky. The buzzards were there, waiting.

  Hat was puzzled. Somebody else had entered the fight, somebody he had not seen. There might be only one, but his common sense warned him there were more. There had been some shooting, but he had no idea who had shot, or why.

  He gave the quail call that would withdraw the Indians, and slipped back to the place where they had left their horses. The Indians joined him. Four were missing.

  Dan Rodelo came up to the little group, walking easily with his Winchester cradled over his arm. Another hung by a strap to his back, and he wore two extra cartridge belts. He had his own canteen and a water skin taken from a dead Indian.

  He came to them out of the desert, and they watched him come. All had seen the Indians withdraw, but they knew it was only a temporary respite.

  Rodelo looked around quickly. Only two horses were there, thegrulla , loaded with the gold, and one other. Badger had been wounded slightly, and had bled quite a bit. He looked drawn and pale.

  “We’d better get out of here while the going’s good,” Dan said, keeping his eyes on Harbin.

  Harbin watched him, his eyes deep-sunken beneath his shaggy brows. “So you made it? I got to hand it to you, Danny. You got guts.”

  “I made it,” Rodelo said. “And I’ll make it all the way.”

  Harbin grinned at him, but it was not a pleasant grin. He took the bridle of thegrulla and started off.

  “Wait,” Rodelo said. “You’d better have a drink.”

  Badger reached for the bag, grabbing it thirstily. Harbin held off, watching Badger drink. Rodelo knew what he was thinking—that he might have poisoned the water.

  After a bit, Harbin drank, while Nora drank from the canteen.

  They started on, but it was stumbling, bitter going. They walked steadily, Dan Rodelo bringing up the rear. A fine white dust rose from the plain. Weird dust devils danced in the distance, and the sun was lost in a brassy sky. They plodded on, and there was no sound but the shuffling of their feet—only occasionally a mumbled curse or their hoarse panting. The ground before them was flat, their course straight except for minor deviations because of creosote or cacti. The two horses hung back, wanting to stop. There was no sign of the Indians.

  The Indians knew they were going, and knew what was at the end of it—they could still afford to wait. They knew the white men had no place to go. Rodelo’s unexpected appearance had spoiled their plan for the moment; they had tried too soon, and had tasted the bitterness of the white man’s bullets, and now they would wait.

  Overhead, also waiting, were the buzzards.

  At last the sun was going down behind the mountains to the west behind the Gulf, spilling crimson and gold over the sky and turning to flame the rugged peaks of the Pinacate. The edge of the dunes became a dark, unending line behind them.

  The sun had set when they reached the shore … The boat was not there.

  They stared out over the blue water. In their exhaustion and despair, they had no words for the emptiness that lay before them. They just stood silent in utter defeat.

  The boat had been their goal, leading them on, drawing them, keeping them going. A haven they would reach, where they could rest, have a drink, eat cooked food once more.

  Had the boat gone? Or had it never come?

  “There’s another bay,” Nora said in a few minutes. “Right south of here.”

  “How far?”

  “I don’t know. Five miles—maybe ten miles even.”

  Ten miles! An impossible distance in their present condition.

  Thegrulla tugged at his lead rope, and Harhin released his grip, almost without thinking. Trailing the rope, the mustang walked away along the flat plain where the tides came, and at a somewhat higher point he stopped and dipped his head out of sight.

  “Water,” Badger said flatly. “He’s found the water hole.”

  They followed the mustang and gathered around the pool. It was small, the
water was brackish, but it was wet and they could drink it.

  “We could send up a smoke,” Harbin suggested.

  “They’d think it was Indians.”

  “What then?”

  “We go on,” Rodelo said. “We have no other choice. We go on tonight.”

  He looked at the packs. There it was, the gold he had come so far to get. There was the gold for which he had served a long, bitter year in prison—the gold he had told himself he would return to those to whom it belonged.

  But what of these men? They had stolen it, or one of them had; and they had gone through a hard struggle to get away with it. How was he going to tell them what he meant to do?

  The moment was near, and when he spoke he must be ready to shoot. Joe Harbin had counted too long on that gold, and no doubt Tom Badger had done his own figuring. Poor Gopher had been out of it from the beginning.

  “We’d better dig in,” Badger said. “Those Injuns will be comin’ back.”

  “Can’t you talk to ‘em? They’re your people.”

  Tom Badger looked at Harbin. “Are you crazy? I’m part Cherokee, and the Cherokee were eastern Injuns until the government took their land. We never even knew about these Yaquis. As far as that goes, the Injuns were always at war with one another—it was their favorite sport. They’d take my scalp as quick as yours.”

  They worked with pieces of shell and scooped out a trench, throwing up a wall of sand. It wasn’t much, but it was something.

  Badger glanced over at Rodelo. “You know where they’ll camp?”

  “North … that’s the only place I know of with water. There’s two or three springs on the shore to the north of here.”

  “D’you think that boat might be in the other bay?”

  “If it came at all, and if it hasn’t gone back, that’s where it will be.”

  Joe Harbin drank the brackish water. He studied Dan Rodelo. “I don’t figure you,” he said. “You’ve come a long way for nothing.”

  Rodelo looked at him and said nothing, but he could feel the showdown coming.