California Trail

by Ralph Compton

  So well had the stones been fitted, he wondered how she had found this loose one. He had a time raising the flat stone enough that he could grip it with his fingers. In the small space beneath the stone was what looked to be nothing more than wadded paper. It was brittle with age, and when Gil brought it out, it broke up in his hands. It had once been a page from a newspaper, and amid the remains, there was the dull gleam of gold! Gil placed the double handful of crumbling newsprint and gold on the hearth, and Rosa knelt beside him. There were eleven thick, eight-sided gold pieces!

  "Tarnation!" Gil exclaimed. "These are fifty-dollar gold pieces! Five hundred and fifty dollars' worth!"

  "It is someone's treasure," said Rosa. "Perhaps we should not disturb it."

  Gil was piecing some of the newsprint together, and finally he came up with a readable date.

  "This paper was dated April second, 1834," he said. "Rosa, this gold's been here more than fifteen years, and the paper in which it was wrapped was printed in San Francisco. The man who left this goid here won't be comin' after it. He's long dead. This money is yours."

  "But what am I to do with it? It saddens me to take it."

  "If you don't," said Gil, "it'll just lay here until somebody else takes it. The man who left it here may have stolen it. I've heard of these eight-sided pieces, but these are the first I've ever seen. They were first minted by the Spanish, I think, when California was under Spanish rule. Here, take them. Tie them up in a bandanna, and tell nobody you have them. There may come a time when you'll need them."

  He spoke more truth than he realized. The time would come when his very future would depend upon that handful of Spanish gold.

  * * *

  Mariposa and Estanzio returned with disturbing news. Once they left the plentiful water near what had been the outlaw camp, they faced a twenty-mile drive. While none of them knew what lay ahead, Gil had his suspicions, and he shared them with the outfit after they'd finished supper.

  "It's goin' to be more mountainous," he said, "and I look for us to have to drive for miles along deep canyons before we find a way across. There'll be dry camps, because the distance between water will be too great for us to make it in a single day's drive. I look for canyons and dropoffs that'll make it impossible for us to trail the herd in the dark."

  "If longhorns get thirsty and stampede in the night," said Ramon, "these same canyons and dropoffs still be there."

  "You're damn right they will be," said Gil, "and one bad run over some canyon rim could cost us the herd and the horse remuda."

  "We push lak hell in daylight," said Juan Padillo.

  "We may have a dry camp ahead of us tomorrow night," said Van.

  "No like dry camp," said Mariposa. "Make cow run."

  "It may come to that," Gil said. "We may have to choose between running them in daylight when we can see where we're going, or having them become thirst-crazy and run at night. Maybe over a canyon rim. We'll move out in the morning the moment it's light enough to see, and drive them as hard as we can."

  "Reckon ye can spare me an' Bola fer two er three hours in the mornin'?" Long John asked. "We seen deer tracks up the creek a while ago. We git there 'fore daylight, with an extry hoss fer the carcass, an' it's venison steaks fer supper."

  "Long John," said Gil irritably, "this is a trail drive, not a deer hunt. Besides, in the early dawn, a shot can be heard for miles."

  "They won't be no shot," said Long John. "We'll use the bola."

  Long John's affable grin was missing, and he had fixed his cold blue eyes on Gil in a manner that suggested there might be trouble in the making.

  "I would like some fresh venison," said Rosa.

  "So would I," Van said.

  Gil didn't fault Van or Rosa for attempting to avoid an ugly scene, but it angered him that they felt a need to interfere. If the time ever came when Gil Austin couldn't stand up to Long John Coons—or any man— he'd as well get on a fast horse and head back to Texas. Rosa's eyes wouldn't meet Gil's, but Van didn't flinch. There was an unmistakable coldness in Gil's voice when he again spoke to Long John.

  "Go on, then," said Gil, "but if there's any trouble— Indian or otherwise—I'm holding you responsible. And don't waste any time catching up to the drive. We have a hard day ahead of us."

  Rosa had always spread her blankets near Gil's, and sometimes they would talk before they slept. But tonight she turned in well ahead of him, and he suspected it was to avoid anything he might say about her interfering in his confrontation with Long John. She fooled him. By the time Gil had shucked his boots and hat, and was settling down with his head on his saddle, the girl was sitting on her blankets looking at him in the moonlight.

  "I know you are angry with me," she said, "but must you always prove you are the boss, even when it gains you nothing?"

  "Rosa," he said, and his voice was dangerously low, "when a man can no longer prove he's the boss, he's done. Like it or not, that's how it is on the frontier."

  "Long John did not question your authority," said Rosa. "He only asked your permission to hunt deer. You could, have simply granted him permission or refused it. Only you saw his request as a challenge to your authority."

  Gil kicked out of his blankets, got up and hunkered down face-to-face with her. Rosa didn't cringe, even when he spoke to her through gritted teeth.

  "I'm almighty damn tired of you talkin' down to me like I'm five years old and you're my mama," he said. "Worse, I feel like I'm stuck with all the miseries of a wife, with none of the benefits."

  "Are those all my faults, or have you not finished?"

  "I have not finished," he growled. "I don't like this… this obsession with Long John Coons. What'n hell do you see in him?"

  "I see a lonely man who would be your friend, if you could stop being the boss long enough to allow it. And there is the little man, Bola, the Argentine. You have orders for him, but never a kind word."

  "Well, by God," said Gil. "it's no wonder we've had so many problems. This is no trail drive, it's a tea social. Are you done tearin' me down?"

  "I am not tearing you down. I am trying to stop you from tearing yourself down. Can you not be the boss without being hated?"

  "I'm trail boss, and this is a trail drive," said Gil. "It's my job to keep these men alive. How I do it is my business, and whether or not they choose to hate me is theirs. You reckon I'd be more popular if I stopped the drive and let all the men ride back to El Paso for a Saturday night in town?"

  "You are making fun of me, and I will speak to you no more."

  Rosa emphasized that by stretching out on one blanket and covering herself—including her head—with a second one. Gil returned to his own bed, not to sleep, but to think. What irked him the most was the fact that Rosa seemed to see, to feel, to understand things he did not. Why had the girl used Long John and Bola to antagonize him? None of the riders—Mexican or Indian— who had joined him for that near-disastrous trail drive from Mexico in 1843 had ever caused him a minute's trouble or questioned his authority. Bola had been part of that outfit, yet he had sought the friendship of the lanky Long John. The men were as different as daylight and dark. Bola was neither Mexican or Texan, but an Argentine. Long John was a man of the gun, the knife, and the saddle, but he was a Cajun from the Louisiana bayous, the son of a conjuring woman. While each man was part of the outfit, they were outcasts, drawn together by the very differences that set them apart. Gil was sorry for some of the things he had said to Rosa, and he sat up, tempted to speak to her. But she seemed asleep, and he again stretched out, his head on his saddle. Sleep was long in coming.

  * * *

  Well before daylight, Long John and Bola rode out, paralleling the creek, to the northeast. Gil and the rest of the outfit had the herd on the trail at the very first gray light of dawn. Mariposa and Estanzio were well ahead of the trail drive, beginning their quest for water for the next day. Gil and Ramon again had charge of the horse remuda and the packhorses. Rosa was riding drag, with Pedro Fa
gano and Juan Alamonte. More than once Gil had been moved to speak to the girl, but Rosa had been cool and unresponsive. Gil began to resent her aloofness, and for the first time began asking himself some troubling questions. Even if he accepted the differences in his age and hers, did he really wish to tie himself to a female who never seemed to see anything but his faults, and was damnably swift in pointing them out?

  * * *

  Long John and Bola had reached their chosen place along the creek well before daylight. The bola was a clever device the Argentine used as other cowboys used a lariat, except that the thing left his hand entirely, wrapping itself around the hind legs of cow, horse, or deer. The bola consisted of three long, braided strands of rawhide, joined at one end and loose at the other. At each of the loose ends was a leather pocket, and in that pocket an iron ball the size of a man's fist. A rider who threw the bola must be strong of arm and shoulder. Taking a grip on the butt, where the three leathers joined, the rider began swinging the bola over his head, much the way a cowboy swung a lariat. Judging he was close enough to a fleeing quarry, the rider released the bola, allowing it to entangle itself around the hind legs of the animal being pursued.

  Long John had watched in silent admiration as Bo had captured horses, cows, and deer with the strange device. The Cajun had made up his mind that he would learn to throw the bola, and unknown to the rest of the outfit, the Argentine had tried to help Long John. But try as he might, Long John hadn't been able to master the damn thing. Time after time he tried, and couldn't twist the bola around a tree trunk often enough for it to be more than just accidental. Long John wasn't accustomed to failure, and his ego suffered mightily. He had half expected the Argentine to laugh at his clumsy efforts, but Bola had not. Thus had begun their strange friendship. The two men had reined up their horses behind a clump of brush where they could observe the stretch of creek the deer seemed to favor.

  "Bo," said Long John, "s'pose ye lef' the hoss here, an' slunk up on 'em clost as ye can, an' made yer throw? They goin''t' light out an' run like hell, oncet we ride outta here."

  "One cannot creep close enough without being heard, Long John," said Bo. "It is for sure the deer will run before I am close enough to throw, but with a horse, I can pursue. A deer's movements are swift, and a standing animal would have to move only a little to evade my throw. It is far easier to catch an animal on the run, using lariat or bola, because the prey is not attempting to avoid your throw. A standing animal may simply dodge your throw, while a running animal seeks only to escape."

  "Reckon that's why I ain't had much luck with yer bola," Long John said. "That tree I was throwin' at should of been runnin'."

  Bo grinned, appreciating Long John's laconic sense of humor. Bo had the bola ready, and no more was said until the deer appeared. There were three, one of them a young buck. Once they decided it was safe to drink and their heads were down, the two riders kicked their horses into a gallop. Long John was in the lead, seeking to flank the buck until Bola could get a clear throw. The trio of deer bounded through the creek and were scrambling up the farthest bank when the buck slipped. It was but a slight delay, just what the Argentine needed. The bola went true, entangled the buck's hind legs, and the animal fell with its hind quarters in the creek. Long John was out of his saddle in an instant, in water above his knees, the Bowie in his hand. So intent was the Ca-jun on cutting the captive buck's throat, he saw or heard nothing, until Bola spoke.

  "Long John," he said quietly, "Indians."

  Long John stood up, the bloody Bowie in his hand, and found himself facing no less than two dozen Indians. Long John drove the Bowie's big blade into the creek bank and then returned the knife to his waistband. As calmly as he could, he untangled the leather tails of the bola from the buck's hind legs and climbed out of the creek to face the Indians. They were afoot, which accounted for the fact he hadn't heard them approach. Long John chose an Indian who looked like a chief, and spoke to him in Spanish.

  "Jefe?"

  "Jefe Tresosos," the Indian replied. "Apache."

  Chief Three Bears, and he spoke at least some Spanish. Long John sighed, and raised his right hand in a sign of peace. Three Bears returned the sign, only to have a brave rush forward, his lance aimed at Long John's throat.

  "Gallo!" bawled the chief. "Ninguno!"

  The arrogant brave backed away, disappointed. Three

  Bears had turned his attention to the dead buck. Raising his eyebrows, he pointed first to the deer and then to Long John. The Cajun shook his head, held up the three-headed bola in his left hand, and pointed to Bo. The Argentine appeared to relax in the saddle, but his right thumb was hooked in his pistol belt, just above the butt of his Colt. Long John shook his head, motioning Bola across the creek. When the Argentine reined up, Long John handed him the bola.

  "Bo," said Long John, "Three Bears wants't' know how ye caught the buck. I'll see kin I git ye a runnin' hoss, so's ye kin show 'im."

  It was a bold move, and it might mean the difference between living and dying. Long John pointed to the brave who had been so quick with his spear, and then the Cajun spoke to Three Bears.

  "Caballo," said Long John.

  "Caballo," Three Bears repeated, turning to the spear-toting brave.

  When the surly brave had returned with the horse, Long John pointed to the Indian, then to the horse. This arrogant young fool's Apache name was Rooster, but when Long John was done with him, he wouldn't have anything to crow about. An Indian had a bizarre sense of humor. If Long John could make them laugh, he and Bo might yet ride away with their hair still in place. Rooster had brought the horse, but he refused to mount. He clearly did not intend to take orders from Long John, but when Three Bears repeated the order, he quickly reconsidered. When he was astride the horse. Long John spoke again.

  "Galope. Rapido."

  This time the Indian obeyed. He kicked the horse into a fast gallop, Bo a few yards behind. The Argentine whirled the iron-balled device above his head a few times, and once released, it wrapped itself neatly around the hind legs of the running horse. The horse went down, and young Gallo took an ignominous tumble in the dirt. The rest of the Indians, including Three Bears slapped their thighs and roared. But Gallo did not laugh. Around his neck, on a leather thong, he carried a Bowie. Whipping the big knife free, he came after Long John, his intentions clear. Nobody spoke, nobody attempted to stop him. Knowing the odds, Long John drew his own Bowie. If he refused to fight, he and Bo were as good as dead. While Indians revered a brave man and might allow him to go free, a coward was shown no mercy. But Long John faced a dilemma. He had a gut feeling that if he won this battle, killing this brash young fool, he would lose the war. The rest of the Apaches would leave him and Bo for the buzzards and coyotes. There was but one way Long John could win, yet sparing young Gallo a death thrust. He must disarm his opponent and count coup.

  Gallo paused. Long John was perfectly at ease, the Bowie rock-steady in his right hand, his gaunt face alight with a malevolent grin. He had been not quite twelve when he'd gutted his first man on the New Orleans waterfront, and Long John Coons had learned a trick or two since then. Gallo made his first thrust, and Long John slammed the flat of his blade against the Indian's wrist. The Bowie fell to the ground, and Long John stood there grinning, waiting for Gallo to recover his weapon. There were grunts of approval from the rest of the Indians. The Apache snatched the Bowie with his left hand, proof enough that he had no grip in the other. Long John waited for his opponent to come to him, but Gallo clearly was not quite as confident with the Bowie in his left hand. He went through the motions, making some halfhearted thrusts and drawing some disapproving grunts from his companions. Finally he shifted the Bowie to his right hand and returned to the fight in earnest. Long John didn't move quite fast enough, and one of Gallo's thrusts nicked the Cajun's right thigh, drawing blood. Flushed with that small success, the Apache tried again, and Long John was ready for him. When Gallo tried to split Long John's belly with a sideways swipe
, the Cajun seemed to fold in the middle, away from the Bowie. The Apache's blade missed, but Long John's didn't. The flat of Long John's blade slammed against Gallo's head just above his left ear, and the Indian went down like he'd been slugged with a singletree. Long John returned the Bowie to his waistband, turned to Three Bears and raised his right hand in the sign of peace. The Apache chief looked at the fallen brave, then at Long John.

  "Gallo hijo," he said, raising his right hand. "Partir pronto."

  Bo was already splashing across the creek, leading Long John's mount and the extra horse they'd brought for the deer carcass. The slain deer the farthest thing from their minds, Long John and Bo wasted no time mounting. But their elation was short-lived. Three Bears wasn't quite ready for them to go. Looking at Long John, he shook his head. He then turned to two of his braves and pointed to the deer carcass. While Long John and Bo looked on in amazement, two of the Indians lifted the deer carcass out of the creek and lashed it to the back of the nervous packhorse. Three Bears raised his right hand and spoke to Long John and Bo.

  "Partir en paz," he said.

  They needed no urging. Bo leading the horse bearing the deer, they rode out at a slow gallop. Gallo was on his knees, glaring at them. Once they were safely away and sure there was no pursuit, they slowed their horses.

  "You did not know Gallo was the son of Chief Three Bears?" Bola asked.

  "Wal, hell no." Long John grinned. "How could I of knowed that? My ma is a conjurin' woman, an' she allus said fer me't' shy away from cards an' wimen. She should of included Injuns, I reckon."

  * * *

  Despite the twenty-mile drive facing them, Gil was feeling good about the progress they were making. He had given the order to move the herd at a faster pace, and the longhorns had responded.

  "Is good," said Ramon. "Good water, good grass las' night, and they run better today."

  "I reckon we've got the hang of it, Ramon," said Gil exultantly. "The only way we can make a longer drive to water is to begin each day's drive after a night of good water and good graze. We don't know this country, and it's lookin' more and more like we'll have to figure at least twenty miles a day from one waterin' hole to the next."