The Edge of Hell

by William W. Johnstone

  Becker swung his left arm in a backhanded blow that cracked across Belinda’s face and sent her spinning off her feet. Then he lunged at Viola. She fired the Winchester, but Becker twisted aside at the last second and the bullet screamed harmlessly past him. He grabbed the rifle barrel and wrenched it aside.

  The next instant a blow exploded against the side of Viola’s head. The Winchester slid from her suddenly nerveless fingers. She felt herself hit the ground, then knew nothing after that.

  * * *

  Stonewall panted as he struggled against the Apache called Bodaway. His left hand was locked around Bodaway’s right wrist, holding the knife away from his body. Stonewall’s right hand had hold of Bodaway’s throat. He dug in his thumb and fingers as hard as he could.

  But Bodaway’s left hand gripped Stonewall’s throat, cutting off his air, and Stonewall knew it was a race to see who passed out first. The Apache was lithe and incredibly strong, a man whose business in life, basically, was killing.

  Stonewall was young and strong, too, though. He just didn’t know how long he could hold out. Already crimson rockets were exploding behind his eyes.

  The sound of a shot nearby made Stonewall flinch. From the corner of his eye, he had seen Viola run out of the house a few seconds earlier, and he was afraid she might have been hit.

  That distraction was enough to allow Bodaway to switch tactics. He let go of Stonewall’s throat and hammered a fist into his temple instead. That blow was enough to stun Stonewall, already on the verge of passing out from being choked. His grip slipped off Bodaway’s wrist, and he expected to feel eight inches of cold, deadly steel penetrating his throat or chest.

  Instead Bodaway slammed the knife’s handle against Stonewall’s head. That finished the job of knocking him unconscious for the second time tonight.

  If he had been awake, Stonewall wouldn’t have given good odds on the chances of him waking up this time, either.

  * * *

  As soon as Mrs. Slaughter fell unconscious at Becker’s feet, out of the line of fire, a rifle blasted from the house and a bullet whistled past his head. He crouched and looked around. Bodaway had just knocked Stonewall Howell to the ground.

  “Leave the kid!” Becker called to his old friend. “Grab Mrs. Slaughter instead.”

  Becker then bent down, took hold of Belinda Rubriz’s arm, and jerked her to her feet.

  “You’re coming with us, Don Eduardo,” he ordered, then shouted, “Herb, give us some cover!”

  Instantly, a barrage of rifle fire ripped out from the schoolhouse. Bullets slammed into the ranch house and forced the defenders to duck. Becker ran toward the school, forcing a stumbling Don Eduardo in front of him at gunpoint while he dragged the half-senseless Belinda.

  Behind them trotted Bodaway with Viola Slaughter’s unconscious form draped over his shoulders as Stonewall had been earlier. Even without the covering fire provided by Herb Woodbury and the other outlaws, the people in the house wouldn’t have been able to shoot for fear of hitting Viola.

  Things hadn’t gone exactly according to plan, Becker thought, but they never did. The key to his genius lay in his ability to adapt his plan to the circumstances, whatever they might be.

  A few moments later, he and Bodaway reached the schoolhouse with their prisoners. Stonewall Howell had been left behind, but that was all right. Becker had traded Stonewall for his sister, and that was a swap he would make any time.

  John Slaughter would have been concerned about his brother-in-law’s safety, of course, but he would be even more worried about his wife.

  “Boss, are you all right?” Woodbury asked as the firing slacked off now that Becker and Bodaway were safe.

  “I’m fine,” Becker replied. “We’ve got what we need. We can get out of here now.”

  Woodbury frowned in confusion and said, “I thought we were gonna burn the place to the ground and kill any witnesses.”

  “That’s not necessary. I’ve decided that we’re going to finish this somewhere else.”

  Bodaway said, “Barranca Sangre.”

  Becker nodded.

  “That’s right. Slaughter’s going to bring Santiago Rubriz there—alone—if he ever wants to see his wife alive again.” He gave the whimpering Belinda a shove toward Woodbury and continued, “Hang on to her and see that she doesn’t get away. You won’t like what happens if she does, Herb.”

  Woodbury holstered his gun and took hold of Belinda with both hands. She shuddered and tried to pull away from him, but his grip was too strong.

  Don Eduardo said, “You don’t have to do this, Ned. Take me and let Belinda and Señora Slaughter stay here. They have nothing to do with your grudge against me.”

  “Forget it,” Becker snapped. “You’re all going. This isn’t going to be over, Rubriz, until you’ve lost everything just like I did.”

  “You cannot mean that.”

  “The hell I don’t.” Becker looked at the Apache and went on, “Keep an eye on things while I write a note to leave for Slaughter. I want to be sure he knows exactly what to do to keep his wife from dying.” Becker smiled. “At least . . . to keep her from dying too soon.”

  Chapter 23

  Slaughter, Santiago, and the other men caught up to the hands driving the herd back to the ranch late in the afternoon.

  Slaughter paused long enough to ask one of the cowboys, “Were you able to round up all the cattle after they scattered to hell and gone like that?”

  The man tipped his hat back and nodded. “Yeah, I think so, boss. Pert-near all of ’em, anyway. What happened up yonder in the mountains? Did you catch up to those rustlers?”

  “We did,” Slaughter said grimly. “A couple of the scoundrels got away, but they were running so hard I doubt if we’ll ever see them in this part of the country again.”

  “I reckon that means the others didn’t get away.”

  “That’s right. And we found out what this is all about, too.” He didn’t offer any further explanation, just asked, “How many men will it take to drive this herd back to the ranch?”

  “Well . . . it’d be a lot of work, but four men could probably handle ’em, I reckon,” the cowboy replied.

  “All right. You’ll be one of those four, Hal. Pick three more. The rest are coming with me back to the ranch as fast as we can get there.”

  “There really is trouble back there?” the cowboy asked with a worried look on his weatherbeaten face.

  “I’ll be surprised if there’s not,” Slaughter said.

  A short time later, with a larger force behind him now, Slaughter was on the move again. When he looked at the sun hanging low in the sky, he knew it would be long after dark before they could reach the ranch. He hoped that whatever Ned Becker had planned, Viola and the men left behind at the ranch could handle it until reinforcements arrived.

  As Santiago rode beside him, the young man said, “I’m sorry my family’s history has brought danger to your family, Señor Slaughter. All this had nothing to do with you.”

  Slaughter grunted and said, “Wrong place at the wrong time, as the old saying goes, I suppose. Becker must have known that he couldn’t make a move against your father on his own ranch. Don Eduardo was too well-defended there. He waited until the don was away from home and thought that would be easier.”

  “But that was foolish on his part, waiting until my father was visiting the famous Texas John Slaughter.”

  With a bleak, icy smile, Slaughter said, “The jury’s still out on that. So far I haven’t managed to do a hell of a lot to disrupt Becker’s plans, whatever they may be.”

  “How could you know what to do when we didn’t find out he was involved with this until a short time ago?”

  Santiago had a point there, but it didn’t make Slaughter feel any better.

  Nothing was going to accomplish that until he got home and saw for himself that his wife was safe.

  * * *

  Slaughter pushed men and horses as hard as he could, but it was
still hours after sundown by the time they approached the ranch. Stonewall and Hermosa should have gotten there quite a while earlier, though, so he hoped they had been able to give Viola a hand in case of trouble.

  Stonewall was young but not green. He had considerable experience as one of Slaughter’s deputies, as well as being a top hand on the ranch. And Hermosa was a fighting man through and through, in Slaughter’s judgment.

  Slaughter had been watching the sky to the south. He knew the sort of orange glow that appeared whenever something big was on fire . . . like a ranch house. He hadn’t seen anything of the sort, so that gave him hope.

  He called a halt when he judged that he and his companions were about half a mile from their destination. As he leaned forward in the saddle he listened intently.

  Santiago must have been doing the same thing, because after a moment the young man said, “I don’t hear any gunfire.”

  “Neither do I,” Slaughter said.

  “That is a good sign, surely.”

  Slaughter shook his head and said, “Not necessarily. It may just mean that the fighting is over.”

  And that everyone there is dead, he added to himself, but he couldn’t put that dire thought into words.

  Slaughter heeled his horse into motion again. He rode at a more deliberate pace now. It was possible that some sort of ambush was waiting for them at the ranch, and he didn’t want to charge blindly into it.

  As they came closer he saw lights. Lots of lights, in fact, as if every lamp in the house was ablaze. That was cause for alarm in itself. Under normal circumstances, by this time of the evening everyone on the ranch would be settling down for a good night’s sleep.

  Slaughter’s nerves wouldn’t take it anymore. He kicked his horse into a gallop that didn’t end until he hauled back on the reins and swung down from the saddle at the gate in the fence in front of the ranch house. Santiago and the rest of the men weren’t far behind him.

  The people in the house must have heard the hoofbeats. Slaughter hoped to see Viola step out of the front door and come onto the porch.

  Instead it was the burly figure of the doctor from Douglas, Neal Fredericks, that appeared. Fredericks stood on the porch and wiped his hands on a rag.

  In the light that spilled through the doorway and the windows, Slaughter saw the crimson splotches on the rag and knew they were bloodstains.

  He threw the gate open and hurried into the yard.

  “Doctor,” he called. “What’s happened here? Where’s Viola?”

  “I have bad news, John,” Fredericks said as Slaughter bounded up the steps to the porch.

  Slaughter’s hand closed tightly around the doctor’s arm. Fredericks winced a little but didn’t pull away.

  “By God, don’t tell me she’s dead,” Slaughter said. “Don’t you tell me that.”

  “I don’t know. She was alive when she left here, that’s all I can be sure of.”

  “When she . . . left here?” Slaughter repeated, confused now. “Where in blazes did she go?”

  “A man named Becker took her, along with Don Eduardo and Doña Belinda.”

  “No!” That shocked cry came from Santiago, who leaped down from his horse and charged up to the porch. “That cannot be!”

  “I’m sorry, son, but that’s what happened,” Fredericks said. “Who are you?”

  Slaughter said, “This is Santiago Rubriz, Don Eduardo’s son.” He struggled to control his raging emotions and went on, “You’d better start at the beginning and tell us what happened, doctor.”

  For the next few minutes, Fredericks did exactly that. Slaughter had to bite back both curses and groans as he heard about how Viola had been captured by the raiders, along with Don Eduardo and Doña Belinda.

  Santiago interrupted to ask, “My stepmother, was she hurt?”

  “Knocked around a little, but that’s all, as far as I know.” Fredericks frowned a little. “Your father was in much worse shape.”

  “You got the bullet out of him, though,” Slaughter said.

  Fredericks nodded and said, “Yes, but he lost a lot of blood. He was very weak and couldn’t afford to lose any more. If that wound of his opened up again . . .”

  The doctor’s voice trailed off and he shook his head. His meaning was all too clear.

  Something else occurred to Slaughter. He said, “My brother-in-law Stonewall and one of Don Eduardo’s vaqueros were on their way here ahead of the rest of us. Have you seen any sign of them?”

  Fredericks pointed over his shoulder with a thumb that still had bloodstains on it.

  “In the parlor with the rest of the wounded,” he said.

  Slaughter stepped past the doctor and went inside. As he came into the parlor he spotted Stonewall sitting on a straight-backed chair as one of the maids wrapped a bandage around his head. The young man exclaimed, “John!” and would have stood up if Slaughter hadn’t motioned for him to keep his seat.

  Stonewall didn’t appear to be in too bad of a shape. The same couldn’t be said of Hermosa, who lay on the same sofa where Don Eduardo had been recuperating the last time Slaughter saw him. Thick bandages swathed the vaquero’s midsection. His eyes were closed. He looked dead, except for the fact that his chest was rising and falling lightly.

  Slaughter and Santiago went over to Stonewall. He gestured toward the bandage on his head as the maid stepped back.

  “Don’t worry about this,” Stonewall said. “I got knocked out a couple of times, but that’s all. My head’s too hard for that to have done any real damage.”

  “Tell us what happened,” Slaughter snapped.

  Stonewall provided his version of events, then added, “I figured that blasted Apache had killed Hermosa, but he was still alive when Doc Fredericks and Jess Fisher found him out yonder not far from the schoolhouse. Hermosa must’ve crawled out of the ditch after he tangled with the Apache, and that Apache left him for dead.”

  Fredericks said, “Any normal man would have been dead. He’d been stabbed at least five times. To be honest, I’m shocked he’s still alive. His insides must be made of rawhide, just like his outsides.”

  Slaughter stepped over to the sofa and looked down at the wounded vaquero. He told Fredericks, “Do everything you can for him, doctor.”

  “I will, don’t worry about that.”

  “Was anyone else killed?”

  “We found a man on top of the water tank,” Fredericks said. “His throat had been cut.”

  “That was Joe Sparkman,” Jess Fisher said gloomily. The ranch foreman had come into the room while Slaughter was talking to Stonewall. “Miz Slaughter put him up there to do some sharpshooting, but I reckon that damned Apache found him before he ever got a chance to take a hand.”

  Slaughter shook his head and asked, “Who is this Apache all of you keep talking about?”

  “His name’s Bodaway or something like that,” Stonewall said. “From the way he and Becker act, they’re old friends. I hear tell that Becker’s got a bad grudge against Don Eduardo, and that’s what caused all this ruckus.”

  “Ned Becker is a madman,” Santiago said. “That is the only way to describe him.”

  “He may be a madman,” Fredericks said, “but he’s got a plan.” He held out a folded piece of paper. “We found this message over by the schoolhouse, held down with a piece of broken brick. They used a bandanna and a sharp stick to make a flag they planted right beside it, so we couldn’t miss it.”

  Slaughter took the paper and unfolded it. A fairly long message was written on it in a compact, precise hand. Ned Becker might be an outlaw, a murderer, and a lunatic, but apparently he was also an educated man, because it was his signature at the bottom of the missive.

  Since the maid had finished bandaging Stonewall’s head, the young man stood up and came over to join Slaughter, Santiago, and Fredericks beside the sofa where the unconscious Hermosa lay. The others watched Slaughter tensely as he read the message.

  After a moment, Slaughter looked up from t
he paper.

  “Becker is very clear about what he wants,” Slaughter said. “I’m to bring Santiago with me, and the two of us—alone—are supposed to cross the border at dawn tomorrow and ride south until someone meets us. From there we’ll be taken to the place where Becker is holding Viola, Don Eduardo, and Doña Belinda. If I turn Santiago over to him, he says he’ll let Viola and me leave and return here unharmed.”

  “I don’t believe that for a second, John,” Stonewall said. “That fella’s loco, and the Apache’s worse. We killed all of his war party when they raided the ranch last night. He’ll want vengeance for them.”

  “You’re not telling me anything I don’t already know,” Slaughter said. “And I sure wouldn’t trust Becker’s word after everything he’s done.” He looked at Santiago. “You’re the last one he wants. What do you say about this?”

  “I would gladly turn myself over to him if I thought it would save the lives of my father and . . . and stepmother. But I think Becker intends to kill all of us.”

  Fredericks said, “Judging by some of the things I heard him say to Mrs. Slaughter, I think you’re right, young man.”

  “But what else can we do?” Santiago went on. “We don’t know where Becker has taken the prisoners. If we’re going to have any chance to rescue them, we have to play along with him.”

  Slaughter scratched his bearded chin and said, “Two of us against Becker, the Apache, and the rest of the gang? We won’t have much of a chance.”

  Stonewall said, “I can bring some men and follow you, John. We’ll be close by, close enough to help when the time comes.”

  Slaughter shook his head and held up the paper. “Becker’s smart enough that he’ll have somebody watching us. He’ll know if there’s a party following Santiago and me, and he’s liable to kill Viola if we try to trick him.”

  “Well, dadgum it!” Stonewall burst out. “What else can we do? There’s no other way to find out where they’re holed up.”

  Slaughter didn’t have an answer for that, but it was in the silence following Stonewall’s angry words that a faint voice spoke up.