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California Trail

Page 35

by Ralph Compton


  * * *

  Rosa's heart almost stopped when she opened the door and found Gil standing there. He stepped in and closed the door.

  "I've had enough of this talk about you stayin' in California," he said,

  "'Do you have one good reason why I should not?'"

  "Because I don't want you to," he growled.

  "That is not good enough," she said.

  "Then, by God," he shouted, "try this. I want you with me, on Bandera Range. I aim to raise cows, horses, chickens, and kids. I aim to put my brand on you, and I don't give a damn if you're just sixteen and I'm a hundred and sixteen!"

  "I am twenty years old," she said.

  Gil looked at her as though she had betrayed him. "Then why the hell have you strung me along, having me believe you were a child?" he shouted.

  "I have not misled you," Rosa said, "for I have known my true birth date for only a little while. I found it within the old locket that belonged to my madre. I am much like her, small in size, but a woman in my heart. It was you who called me a child."

  "So I'm the cause of all my troubles," said Gil. "Do you aim to tell me to go to hell, shoot me, or just keep me in sackcloth and ashes for the rest of my life?"

  "None of those things," Rosa said, with the half-smile that had always irked him. "I think having Gil Austin admit to being mortal will be enough."

  "You purely know how to humble a man," said Gil, "but I'm glad we finally know how old you are. I'll feel better about marrying you."

  "I will not marry a man who leaves me on the ranch and rides away to town to become a lawyer," Rosa said.

  "I've always been a cowboy," he said, "and that's all I'll ever be. Do you reckon there's a lawyer anywhere in the world that's made two hundred forty-four thousand dollars in less than six months?"

  "I do not wish to talk about money. I have waited a long time for you. Must I wait until we return to Texas?"

  "No way, my little chili pepper."

  She slapped him. Hard. He backed away, unbelieving.

  "Do not ever call me that again," she hissed, "or I will tear your hair out by the roots!''

  He seized her. and when their kiss ended, they were lying across the bed. Her face was flushed and her eyes were closed. Suddenly he laughed and sat up. She opened one eye.

  "Remember that night," he said, "when you came into my room jaybird naked? I thought you were going to get into bed with me."

  "I got no encouragement," she said, "but you did see me."

  "I reckon," he said. "I may be old, but I'm still alive in some places. Let's go somewhere, find a preacher, and take up where we left off."

  "But it is late."

  "Not as late as it's gonna be. Tonight you have a bed. Tomorrow night, we'll be on our way to Texas. You'll be on hard ground, rocks pokin' you in the backside, and a dozen men listenin' for all they're worth."

  "Let us find this preacher, then."

  They found one, and while they wouldn't have a ring until the next day. they did have a best man. Long John Coons was glad to oblige.

  * * *

  July 24, 1850. San Francisco

  Gil bought Rosa the ring she hadn't had when they'd stood before the preacher the night before. Since it was their last night in San Francisco, the outfit had made an event of it. Even Van went out and had a few drinks to celebrate a wedding he had thought would never come to pass. Everybody was at the hotel in time for breakfast except Long John.

  "Damn it," said Gil, "he knows we're pullin' out today. If I can be up and ready at daylight, why can't he?"

  "Perhaps he has a good reason," said Rosa.

  As it turned out, Long John did. He finally showed up at ten o'clock, with a girl who was no older than Rosa.

  She had dark eyes, long black hair, and curves that would have made Kate Donnegan envious.

  "This is Suzanne," said Long John. "She's from New Orleans, an' don't much like Californy. She's goin''t' Texas wi' me."

  Suzanne looked at Long John in a way that said the lanky Cajun was in deep water.

  "Long John does not just play with fire," Vicente observed. "He takes a keg of powder with him and lights the fuse."

  They had ridden the California Trail to the end, and on the day they departed for Texas came the news. The ship on which Lionel Donnegan had escaped had been lost at sea. There were no survivors.

  Epilogue

  Texas Ranger Captain Benjamin McCulloch was born in Rutherford County, Tennessee, on November 11, 1811. A friend of David Crockett, McCulloch went to Texas and fought under General Sam Houston in the battle of San Jacinto. He served as scout for Ranger Captain John Coffee (Jack) Hays in 1842, and in 1846, led a spy company of Rangers into Mexico, during the Mexican war.

  W.A.A. (Bigfoot) Wallace was born in Lexington, Virginia, on April 3, 1817. in 1836, after a brother and a cousin died in the Goliad Massacre, Wallace set out for Texas to "square the account." He joined the Rangers under Captain John Coffee (Jack) Hays, and was active with the Rangers all through the war with Mexico.

  N.H. (Old Man) Clanton and his gang of outlaws settled in southern New Mexico and Arizona, after being run out of Texas by the Rangers. Clanton's four sons —Isaac, Ike, Phineas, and Bill—were gunslingers, sidewinder mean. The Clantons moved into Tombstone following a silver strike there, and rose to power through payoffs to Sheriff Johnny Behan, staunch opponent of Wyatt Earp.

  After Bill Clanton died at the OK Corral, things were never the same. A year later, in 1882, Curly Bill, John Ringo, Old Man Clanton and the rest of his boys ambushed a mule-train in Skeleton Canyon, slaughtering nineteen muleteers and taking seventy-five thousand dollars in silver bullion. But relatives of the men slain in the bullion-train massacre got their revenge. While Clanton and some of his gang drove stolen cattle through Guadalupe Canyon, they were shot dead, ending the Clanton reign.

  Joaquin Murrietta's young wife was raped by California miners, and his 1849 gold claim was forgotten, as Murrietta organized a band of eighty gun-slinging desperados and terrorized the mining camps of the High Sierra. He was finally ambushed in 1853, by a Los Angeles gunfighter and twenty men. His head was severed and sold for thirty-five dollars. He was twenty-three.

 

 

 


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