But in spite of how all Miss Bellotti’s fancy clothes nearly caused my heart to jump out of my chest I still had questions for Eban. “So why are you wearing that sombrero and riding Joshua’s horse? Why is Woody Dunn driving the wagon? Did something happen back home?”
Eban looked down at the ground and wrung his hands together. Finally he shook his head and turned back to me. “I didn’t know if I should tell you this or not, son, but I reckon I got to. That K.O. feller came by the cafe yesterday, asking after you. Maggie talked to him. He liked to have scared her to death. He’s got a way about him, a real mean way. Maggie don’t get rattled easy. She’s seen her share of bad men.”
“Lacey!” I sputtered. “Was he looking for her at all? Is she all right?”
“Maggie shut down the cafe.” Eban went on. ”Both her and Lacey are awful worried over you, but otherwise they’re fine. They’re at the cabin with Joshua where they’ll be safe. He won’t let anybody in, plus we sent word for help from Sacramento City. I’ll talk to Wimmer as soon as I get to the saw mill, let him know what’s going on. I expect he can rustle up some more men. We got to find this feller fast or a lot more folks are liable to get killed.”
“What about you, Eban,” I asked. “You’re riding Joshua’s horse. You got on a different shirt and you’re wearing a sombrero like me. K.O. asked about you, didn’t he?”
Eban’s lip curled into a snarl. “Well, sorta.” He spit in the dust. “He asked Maggie where the useless gray haired old mossback that drove the wagon was. When Maggie told him she didn’t know anybody like that she said he gave her a look Lucifer himself would’ve been proud of. Told her he’d find me anyhow, whether she said anything or not.”
My eyes narrowed and I could feel the skin on my forehead burn. Now I’d put everybody I cared about in danger, not just Lacey but Maggie, Eban, and Joshua too. Waiting for help would take way too long. This was my fault. I had to make dang sure nobody got hurt. Tomorrow morning, early, I would take care of K.O. Manuel once and for all. I set my mind on it. I had to do it.
“Tom, you okay?” Eban asked, his voice loud.
“Oh.” I jerked back from the scheme brewing in my mind. “I’m sorry, I guess I was thinking about Lacey and Maggie and all the trouble I caused.” I said it so that Eban wouldn’t stew over what I was cooking up.
“You ain’t the cause of this, Tom,” he went on, softer now. “It’s all the doing of that K.O. feller and his henchmen. Bad men make trouble for the good folks in the world. That’s the way it’s always been. You best get used to it.”
“Yeah, but if I hadn’t gone looking for Lacey’s pa we’d be safe now,” I said.
“That’s true, but you still done right. If you hadn’t gone after the Major he might’ve died. Sometimes bad things happen to folks who do good. This is one of those times. Now we got to stay calm, stay together and take care of things,” he said with some fire, then took a deep breath and added. “Good always wins out over bad in the end.”
I looked straight at him. He had a sure as shooting look that made me feel better right off. How K.O. Manuel could ever call Eban a useless old mossback I couldn’t understand.
“Thanks, Eban. You always find a way to ease my mind when trouble comes.” I smiled in spite of how scary things seemed. I felt some better now that Eban had gotten back here, but the news that K.O. had been to the cafe unsettled me something fierce—all the more reason to take care of K.O. Manuel as soon as I could.
Where the road took a hard left turn into Coloma we stopped. To the right a narrow trail led to the ford across the American River. Eban pointed that way. “You go back to Bug Riddle’s place and wait. Stay out of sight and out of trouble. I got things to do at the saw mill. I’ll be as quick as I can. And I’ll find the Major and bring him with me. Now it ain’t that I don’t trust you but you’ve been way too headstrong lately. I want your word of honor you’ll go straight to the camp and stay there.”
I nodded. “I’ll go,” I said honestly, the promise easy to keep. I didn’t plan on going after K.O. until tomorrow morning anyway. While I headed to the ford I knew Eban would keep his eye on me as long as he possibly could just to make sure I did like he asked. I didn’t even need to look back to check.
He’d said I’d been headstrong lately and I reckoned I had, but I’d rather look at what I’d done more as something any good man would’ve done. Still, I knew Maggie and Lacey would figure that my following the boy on the mule had been out and out foolhardy. When it came down to it most folks would agree with them. And the risk in what I planned for tomorrow I couldn’t deny, that’s for sure. I could get hurt real easy, but I had to do it for Lacey and Maggie, for everybody really.
At the ford I stopped and peered up the hill on the far side of the river. I could barely make out Bug Riddle at the top of the ravine, staring down at me with the Hawken rifle in his left hand. I took off the sombrero and waved it. I didn’t want to take any chance that Bug would mistake me for somebody else and decide to shoot.
But Bug put the rifle down and I splashed into the water. Midstream, with the rushing current churning around me, it suddenly came to me how calm I felt about everything I’d planned to do tomorrow. After all, I’d made up my mind to kill a man, no ifs ands or buts about it, and I wasn’t even nervous, not one bit, not even a shake, a tingle, a twitch, nothing—as cool as a cucumber. Yes sir, it’ll all be as easy as peach cobbler. I didn’t have a worry in the world. Not a one. Nope. No sweat.
After Rojo climbed onto the far bank, I wiped my forehead with the sleeve of my shirt. It seemed a lot hotter today than yesterday and right off I mopped my brow again, this time with the other arm. It must be about the hottest day ever around here I decided. On the way up the hill, I whistled a song I’d heard last summer at the beef stew feeds Maggie had on Sunday afternoons. Still, in spite of the heat, I felt good, real good. I wiped the sweat away again, still whistling, then dried my clammy palms on my roll-up pants, and wondered why my left hand suddenly shook so dang hard.
##
The sun set a little while ago and the sky over the American River slowly filled with stars. I’d made more pan bread and a pot of beans. Boyd bagged two rabbits that we’d roasted over the open fire. Eban and the Major got back from Coloma just before supper and Lacey’s pa looked real dashing with his hair and beard trimmed nice and neat, and all dressed up in new blue pants, a gray shirt and a flat brimmed black hat. I figured they’d both spent most of the afternoon drumming up help in corralling K.O. Manuel and his cronies.
Boyd sat down next to Bug. I poured him a fresh cup of coffee then held the pot up high. “Anybody else want more?” I asked. When no one spoke up I put the pot beside the fire and sat next to the Major.
Eban hacked up a frog from his throat so everybody would listen to him. “You all know Major Lawson and me spent the afternoon with Wimmer and some other folks from Coloma. They’ve been concerned about the mining cooperative and the killings but didn’t know a lot of what the Major does about these varmints. He turned a lot of heads there today but I’ll let him tell you what he told them.”
Major Lawson glanced around all of us till his eyes stopped on me. “I never thought bread and beans could taste so good, Tom.” His eyes moved. “And Boyd, I’ll always think of roast rabbit as a wonderful treat. I want to thank you, both of you, for feeding me so well in spite of such limited conditions. Mr. Riddle, I owe you a ton of thanks too for letting us impose on you like we’ve done. Your hospitality is appreciated.”
Bug looked at the ground and mumbled under his breath.
The Major paused, twisted the tin cup in his hands and waited until Bug settled down. “Like Eban said, we talked to folks in town and tomorrow morning some men will go after the mining cooperative starting with its leader, Romano Manuel, or Romy as he’s usually called.” The Major used K.O.’s real first name. I hadn’t known it. And he’d said K.O.’s last name not as ‘Man-well’ like the Mexicans would but as ‘Man-u-well’ like A
mericans did.
He took a sip of coffee before he went on. “Romy Manuel was born on a rancho near San Antonio to a wealthy Mexican of Spanish descent and an American woman from a well-to-do New Orleans family. When Texas declared its independence and Santa Ana marched on the Alamo there, his family fled to Mexico City for safety, but somewhere along the way bandits jumped them and killed his mother. Romy Manuel blamed her death on the Texicans. And to him there was no difference between Texicans and Americans. We were all gringos and equally responsible.
“By all accounts from people who knew him then, Manuel’s mother had been a wonderful woman, warm and loving. He was her only child and she doted on him. Perhaps she spoiled him. But his father was a harsh man. He had a reputation for cruelty both in Mexico and Texas, and now Romy fell totally under his sway. Maybe this is where young Romy Manuel found the savagery he is so well-known for today, a simple case of like father like son.”
“But Major,” I blurted, “why do folks call him K.O?”
“That’s a nickname Americans gave him from when he went across California fighting in cantinas. People paid a lot of money to see him pound another man senseless. They say he beat several men to death.” Major Lawson stopped and looked at each one of us.
My left hand started to shake again. The same thing had happened off and on all day and I wondered if I was sick or something. I rested it on my leg and put my right hand on top. That seemed to help some.
Major Lawson started in again. “Romy Manuel was in San Diego when war broke out with Mexico. Reid Harrison and Frank Barney, once associates of mine on General Scott’s staff in Washington and assigned similar supply duties in San Diego, sold Romy Manuel the information about Kearny’s Army of the West’s imminent arrival in California. Manuel knew the first piece of civilization Kearny would come to after a hard trek across a barren desert would be the rancho of a man named Walker, and Walker was married to Romy Manuel’s cousin.”
Now full dark and moonless and with only a pile of red-hot coals left of the fire, the faces of the men around me had faded into the shadows. Major Lawson grabbed a log in each hand and placed them one at a time on the embers. A strong flame flared up, flashing across the eyes of each of us.
I reached for the coffee pot. “Anybody want some?” I asked. “It’s the last of it.” Boyd and Eban both spoke out and I filled their cups before I poured the rest of the brew into mine.
When everyone settled down the Major continued. “We don’t know exactly what happened, but we are fairly certain that Romy Manuel alerted someone in the local militia and they sent a company of lancers to intercept Kearny. They wound up at an Indian pueblo called San Pasqual close to the Walker Rancho. When Kearny found out he took his exhausted troops there at once. In the battle that followed the lancers killed over twenty men in Kearny’s force of a little more than one hundred.
“But things got worse the next day when the lancers jumped Kearny again and chased his small, battered army up a hill. Only by the incredible bravery of Kit Carson and two other men who slipped through the lines and brought help from Stockton’s naval force in San Diego did any of them live at all. Right about that time Harrison, Barney and Manuel disappeared and haven’t been seen until now.
“As far as the government of the United States is concerned there is no hard evidence that any of the three did anything illegal during the war. While it looks very much like Harrison and Barney sold military secrets to the enemy there’s no proof at all. And Romy Manuel, well, he was the enemy. But . . .” Major Lawson paused and looked hard at the face of each man one more time, “ . . . we now have an eyewitness to what they’ve done here, if what I’ve heard is true, and that will be enough to convict them of murder, fraud and robbery. Tomorrow, God willing, we’ll put an end to their evil doings.”
“But sir,” I exclaimed, “Lacey said K.O.—ah, I mean Romy Manuel—told General Santa Ana personally about Kearny’s men. Ain’t that the truth?”
The Major smiled and rolled his eyes back like folks do when they remember good times, then gave a little chuckle. “Lacey loved Santa Ana’s name. You know how young girls can be. They latch onto things they like and make them bigger than they really are. I told her the story because everyone in San Francisco talked about it, and I also told her that Manuel’s father and Santa Ana were lifelong friends. Romy Manuel was certainly a spy, but I doubt if he reported his discovery to Santa Ana personally.”
What Lacey’s pa said almost sounded like Lacey had fibbed some, and that ate at me a bit much. “But she said he told Santa Ana himself, and after the Americans were saved Santa Ana got mad and said he would kill K.O. and his cronies if he caught them.”
“Well, Lacey got it almost right. Remember she was only twelve and a lot more interested in romantic notions than with the hard realities of war. She liked Santa Ana in spite of him being the enemy President because his name reminded her of Santa Claus. And she liked Kit Carson because he was brave and daring. Those are things that are important to young girls. But Santa Ana is a vengeful man, and he did order the execution of Romy Manuel and his accomplices after Kearny’s men got away.”
I rubbed my twitching left hand hard to calm it down. The Major made sense. Back during the war I know I wasn’t as full grown as I am now. It stands to reason Lacey would be younger too. I’d just never thought of her as a little girl before. After all, she was real close to my age. I didn’t know much about young girls and how they were, so I’d have to take the Major’s word for it. Come to think of it, except for Lacey I didn’t know much about girls at all, and she could be awful perplexing at times.
Eban stood. “We got a long day tomorrow. I think I’ll turn in,” he said.
Major Lawson held out his hand. “I agree. Will you help an old soldier to his feet, Eban?”
He pulled the Major up and he limped to his bedroll, using his army carbine for a crutch. Boyd helped his Pa to their bedrolls and it came to me how tired I was, so I turned in too.
In spite of the warm night I pulled the blanket tight around me. Somehow it felt comforting to have something to hide under out here in the open under the stars. A tiny chunk of the top of the moon crept over the Sierra to the west and a mockingbird chattered from the pines behind the hill. Lulled by the peace and quiet, my eyes fluttered shut. Sleep would come soon.
Right before I dozed off I heard it, coming from down by the river. Music! Someone strummed a guitar. Maybe it was the guy Bug almost shot yesterday. I settled back and listened. A man sang a wonderful tune in a high voice as smooth as Lacey’s cheek. I could only get a word here and there ‘cause he sang it all in Mexican, but somehow that didn’t matter. The song had such a sad, mournful tone to it that I could imagine the words.
I closed my eyes and he told about his girl, Carmelita, a pretty dark haired senorita. He loved her very much. Then the song changed a little and another man sang along with the first one in an even higher voice. Strangely the two men together sounded so much sadder and lonelier than before. Something had happened to Carmelita, maybe she’d died, or maybe she went off with another man. Either way he missed her terribly.
The song made me think of Lacey. I’d known her for only a short time but right now I sure missed her a lot, like the fellow down by the river missed his senorita. I’d loved my Ma and now Maggie, but it didn’t seem the same as Lacey. I couldn’t get a solid grip around it but Lacey had a special hold on me. Like the singer and his Carmelita, I’d be powerful hurt if something happened to her. And that’s why I had my mind so dead set on taking care of Romy Manuel tomorrow, once and for all.
He’d been lurking around the cafe yesterday. I knew if he ever figured out Webster Lawson had a daughter working there Lacey would be in more trouble than she could handle. I had to protect her from that. I couldn’t count on the men from Coloma to do the job for me, even if the Major and Eban went with them. If you want something done right you do it yourself my Pa always said. I would take care of Romy Manuel in the morni
ng, like I planned.
The song ended and a deep stillness rolled up from the river, but the sad, loneliness of the melody covered me like a thick fog. I turned onto my side and rubbed my twitching left hand. When I got back to the cabin I’d ask Maggie to look at it. She’d know what to do.
8
Rojo skidded to a stop in front of the cafe. I jumped to the ground and rushed through the open door. Inside the dining room chairs were tossed about, tables upended, broken dishes and crockery strewn across the floor. Morton sat off to the right at the only table still upright, his face splattered in a plate of mashed potatoes smothered in bloody gravy. Across the room Doak Wiggins leaned against the east wall, eyes blank, chest shredded from a shotgun blast. Jeremiah lay on the floor beside him, his face battered beyond belief, his teeth scattered among the chunks of busted plates.
In a heartbeat, as quick as a strong wind would blow a leaf, I swept into the kitchen. Eban lay face up just inside the door, a bullet hole between his eyes. Maggie slumped backwards across the kitchen table, the wooden handle of a butcher knife sticking up from her chest. I heard a gurgle from the corner. Baby Josie lay on the cot, her little feet and hands waving, while an arm wrapped around her waist held her tight against a yellow dress with blue flowers on it.
Lacey! Suddenly I was there, looking down from above onto a pool of blood that covered the cot, blood from Lacey’s slashed throat.
“No!” I screamed. Lacey, Eban, Maggie gone. My eyes popped open. My breath came hard and fast. Sweat poured across my face. My left hand shook something terrible. Darkness covered the river. A thousand stars filled the sky. The moon hung pale and low off to the west. A faint glow from the coming sunrise tinted the eastern sky.
Into the face of the devil: A love story from the California gold rush Page 15