Damnation Road

by Max McCoy

  Gene laughed.

  “None of the cowboys I know have ever fired their guns in anger,” he said. “You remind me, stranger, of somebody I met a few years back—a man who showed up at my ranch, going by the name of Hawkins, always looking over his shoulder. He liked it here, said he wanted to come back with his wife and baby boy.”

  “So what was his real name?’

  “I think he was Bill Doolin, escaped from the federal jail at Guthrie. When he left here, he rode back to Oklahoma Territory—straight to his death.”

  “Heard about that,” Gamble said.

  “You have the same look about the eyes.”

  “Are you saying that—”

  “Not saying a thing, friend. We mind our own business here in the Tularosa basin, not that of our neighbor, as long as it doesn’t pinch us anywhere tender. And Mister Hawkins was a friend of mine, so the only tender place it pinches me is that he’s gone.”

  Gamble nodded.

  “Tell me about the country to the south and west of here.”

  “It’s extra special rough.”

  “It couldn’t be anything less,” Gamble said. “Also, does an elephant mean anything to you? As in a place name or a geographic feature or—”

  “Yes,” Gene said. “There’s Elephant Butte, about twelve miles from here on the Rio Grande. Named for a huge outcropping that’s in the shape of an elephant. There a ferry across the Rio Grande there—one of the only places to cross, in fact, for many miles.”

  “That’s it,” Gamble said. “I’m obliged.”

  “You must be planning some silver prospecting, if you’re asking about crossing the Rio Grande at Elephant Butte,” Gene said. “Good luck. I tried my hand at prospecting, but went bust. The story of me and money is a sad one.”

  “Not everybody can be a Hearst.”

  “Or wants to be.”

  Gamble laughed.

  “It’s about time for me to get moving, Gene. I have supplies to gather.”

  “Go to Walton’s, across the street. Tell them I sent you. They’ll give you a fair deal. Make sure you buy some warm clothes—it’s hotter than hell now, but it gets cold at night, especially when you get above six thousand feet.”

  Gamble nodded.

  “Really think Bill Doolin hid out on your spread?”

  “I do.”

  “So you think his mistake was in going back to Oklahoma Territory?”

  “No,” Gene said. “I think his mistake was in taking up bank robbery as a profession.”

  TWENTY-ONE

  That night, Gamble bedded down outside of town, on a little flat spot with a juniper tree. He lay on his back beneath a blanket and a rubber tarp, a few yards from the lingering embers of a fire he had made for frying bacon and boiling coffee for his supper.

  Lightning flickered in the San Andres, and thunder shook the Tularosa basin. The rain started slowly, in big drops that splattered into the white sand and made the dying fire hiss and gush smoke. Then it began to rain in earnest.

  Gamble sat up, holding the rubber tarp over his head.

  Laughter came from the other side of the fire, where the ghost of his father sat on a rock, a bony finger pointing at him.

  “Sonuvabitch,” Gamble muttered.

  The skeletal jaw opened and closed.

  “What do you want?” Gamble asked. “Speak, I charge thee, speak!”

  The ghost gathered its crutch and stood, but remained silent.

  “Not even for Shakespeare?”

  Lightning arced overhead and the ground trembled. While the bolt flashed, the ghost became invisible, but took form again with the darkness.

  “I am becoming weary of this madness,” Gamble said. “It has become monotonous. For some reason, I had thought insanity would involve more variety. I am ashamed to have a father that has made such a dull shade.”

  The ghost shook with fury.

  “Speak, damn you!”

  The ghost lurched forward, the crutch knocking sparks from the fire. Gamble immediately regretted having cursed the thing, even if it was a thing of his own imagination.

  It drew close to him.

  Pausing less then a foot away, the ghost leaned down and peered into Gamble’s face. The rain beat upon the stony white cranium and pooled in the eye sockets. The jaw dropped and rested limply upon the breast of the ragged butternut jacket.

  Gamble threw off the tarp and blanket and stood.

  “It has been thirty-seven years since I last laid eyes on the living you,” Gamble said. “What offense have I committed that has summoned you from the grave? What commandment did I break that has interrupted your slumber? It cannot be murder, for I have killed since I was but little more than a child. It cannot be adultery, for I have long made fornication a science. Stealing? Ha! I have made my living by theft. Armed robbery is a specialty. About the only thing I will not do is bear false witness or deny God although the old bastard makes me mad enough to spit!”

  Lightning struck the juniper tree. The blast knocked Gamble to the ground, unconscious, and sent a geyser of sparks into the air. When he came around, it had stopped raining. The ghost was gone.

  TWENTY-TWO

  “What kinds of things did he buy?”

  Jaeger had his notebook out and had assumed his most stern Pinkerton look, the one which was intended to convey serious business. Old Man Walton sat in a rocker on the porch of his general store, gently stroking a cat that was asleep in his lap.

  “Why did you say you were looking for this fellow?”

  “I didn’t say.”

  Jaeger’s impatience was growing. After receiving the telegram two days ago from the Santa Fe agent that Gamble had gotten off the train at the Engle depot, Jaeger had hitched a series of rides on three different railways to cross New Mexico Territory from the northeast corner down to the southwest. He had been canvassing the storefronts, trying to pick up Gamble’s trail.

  “What kind of law did you say you were?” the old man asked.

  “I’m a Pinkerton operative,” Jaeger said, his voice rising.

  “Shush,” the old man said. “You’ll wake up Killer.”

  But the cat seemed far from disturbed.

  “What did the subject buy?”

  “The first time or the next time?”

  “He was here twice?”

  “It’s what I said, weren’t it?” the old man asked. “Boy, you sure are dumb for a detective. Can’t imaging how you fellers ever caught Jesse James. Oh, that’s right, you didn’t—it were the coward Robert Ford that done him in.”

  “That was long before my time,” Jaeger said. “What did he buy the first time?”

  “Blanket, gutta-percha tarpaulin, skillet.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Don’t recall.”

  “Don’t you keep a record of sales or—”

  “Now why the hell would I want to do that?” Walton asked. “Somebody comes in to buy stuff, I cipher it out on a sheet of brown paper that I wrap the truck in. That way they know I didn’t cheat them. I know I didn’t cheat them, so why should I copy it out for myself?”

  “How do you know if you’ve made a profit?”

  “If there’s money left over at the end of the month to buy coffee and beans, I’ve made a profit. Don’t nobody need more than coffee and beans, and maybe a twist of tobacco. Of course, some people smoke. You chew or smoke?”

  “I avoid tobacco,” Jaeger said. “It’s a filthy habit.”

  “Killer don’t think so.”

  “What Killer may or may not think is immaterial,” Jaeger said. “Tell me about the second time he came back. Was it the same day or the next?”

  “The next. But he weren’t alone.”

  “Describe his companions.”

  “In addition to the tall thin soldier we’ve been talkin’ about, there was an English-sounding feller, and a wicked hellcat of a girl with some kind of Musselman veil over her face. She was trouble, wasn’t she, Killer?”

&n
bsp; The old man scratched the cat beneath the chin and the cat roused briefly and shook its head, annoyed.

  “Sorry, Princess Killer. I’ll let you sleep.”

  “What kind of name is that for a common cat?” Jaeger asked. “It doesn’t even make sense.”

  “My damned cat,” the old man said. “I can name it what I damn well please. It looked like Princess Killer to me. Any more of your smart Dutch lip, and you’ll just have to do some real detective work instead of asking old men questions.”

  “Ja, sorry. Tell me the things they bought.”

  “They made my month, I tell you,” Walton said. “They outfitted themselves real good—clothes for all three, and more cook stuff—pans and cups and a coffeepot—and more bedrolls and rope and so forth.”

  “Rope?”

  “Lot of it,” Walton said. “Three, four hundred feet.”

  “Did it seem they were going prospecting?”

  “Nah, they didn’t buy those kinds of tools—no picks or hammers or chisels. Nobody prospects anymore, not since the price of silver went bust in ninety-three. It was more like they were going to do some climbing. Had the impression they were headed for the mountains, because of the clothes they bought. Generally, you don’t buy flannel this time of year unless you’re going to gain a few thousand feet in altitude.”

  “But they did not say where they were going?”

  “No,” Walton said. “I asked ’em, friendly-like, but they was a closemouthed bunch. Oh, I nearly forget. They also bought five boxes of Robin Hood smokeless shotgun shells in twelve gauge.”

  “Yes, I understand,” Jaeger said, writing furiously. “They couldn’t have carried this much, they must have—”

  “—had animals, yeah. Three horses and a couple of pack mules. They loaded it all in front of the store before they took off.”

  “Which direction did they go?”

  “Out of town.”

  “Yes, but which direction?”

  “Couldn’t tell you,” Walton said. “Didn’t linger to see them off.”

  Jaeger closed the notebook.

  “Thank you,” he said. “You’ve been of some help. Good day.”

  “That’s it?” the old man asked. “All I get is a fare-thee-well?”

  Jaeger paused.

  “What is it you want, then?”

  “That information must be worth at least five dollars to the mighty Pinkerton detective agency.”

  “We are not in the habit of paying citizens for helping us bring criminals to justice.”

  “Hear that, Killer? Then if these strange-looking folks come back, we just might not tell old high-and-mighty Pinkerton operative here about it. In fact, we just might tell these desperadoes that the Pinkertons was looking for them.”

  “All right,” Jaeger said.

  He handed the old man a five-dollar bill.

  “I’ll need a receipt for that,” Jaeger said.

  The old man laughed so loudly that it woke the cat, which jumped down and ran beneath the porch.

  “If you don’t remember where they went, do you remember where they came from?”

  “Don’t know about the other two,” Walton said, “but the soldier feller the first day walked over from the Conquistador yonder.”

  Jaeger tipped his bowler and crossed the street.

  “What’s your pleasure?” Dave the bartender asked.

  “A bit of a chat,” Jaeger said.

  “Hell, there’s no business. I ain’t got nothing better to do. What you want to talk about?”

  “There was a tall man in a Rough Rider uniform here two days ago. Remember him?”

  “Sure. He had ice water and a ham sandwich.”

  “Good, good,” Jaeger said. “Did you see him again?”

  “Nope, that was the only time.”

  “How about an Englishman and a young woman with a veil over her face?”

  “I would have liked to have seen that,” the bartender said. “Heard they were in town yesterday, but I didn’t get to lay eyes on them myself. Somebody told me they were over at the livery, buying animals.”

  “All right,” Jaeger said. “This one time the subject was here, did he say anything to you about what he was doing in town or where he was going?”

  “He was pretty tight-lipped with me,” the bartender said. “But Mister Rhodes, one of the regulars, came in here and they struck up a peculiar conversation.”

  “Peculiar how?”

  The notebook came out of Jaeger’s pocket.

  “Well, I didn’t understand half of it,” the bartender said. “The soldier fellow had this shotgun that looked like a cannon with him and he had a map all spread out on the table, but he put it up when Mister Rhodes sat down. They talked about this and that, and about poor old Bill Doolin—”

  “William Doolin? The Oklahoma Territory outlaw?”

  “He’s the one,” the bartender said. “They mentioned Guthrie, up in Oklahoma Territory. Then the soldier asked Mister Rhodes about the elephant.”

  “What do you mean, the elephant?”

  “Elephant Butte, southwest of here. That’s where the ferry is that crosses the Rio Grande. Guess the soldier fellow was headed that way.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  The ferry crossing across the Rio Grande was at a broad shallow spot on the riverbank, where the twenty-five-foot wooden ferry was winched up and the gate dropped onto the gravel. To the northeast loomed the massive banded formation named Elephant Butte.

  “I’ll be damned,” Jacob Gamble said, standing on the gravel bank of the river and gazing at the rock. “It does look like an elephant, sort of, with its trunk unfurled on the ground in front of it.”

  “Did you think I’d lie?” Anise asked.

  “Not about that,” Gamble said.

  The ferryman walked over and hooked his thumbs beneath the suspenders of his faded denim overalls. He was an old man with a long face that had been turned to leather by the sun and was framed by wild white hair. Beneath the overalls was a tattered and dirty red flannel long-sleeved undershirt. He was chewing tobacco and, before he spoke, he spit a brown glob into the river.

  “What’s wrong with her face?” The ferryman asked.

  “Old wound,” Gamble said.

  “All of you crossing together?”

  “Yes,” Lord Weathers said. “What’s the fare?”

  “Twenty dollars.”

  “That sounds like rather much.”

  Gamble shook his head.

  “Just because this fellow has a British accent doesn’t make him the queen of England,” Gamble said. “And even if he was rich, that’s no excuse for gouging him on the fare. Your board there says twenty-five cents for men, twenty cents for animals, and fifteen cents for women and children.”

  “Why are women cheapest?” Anise asked.

  “Pretend it’s chivalrous,” Gamble told her, then turned back to the ferryman. “According to your posted rates, that’s a buck sixty. That seems a little high to me, but we’ll pay it. In fact, we’ll pay you three dollars if you’ll keep your mouth shut and not tell anybody we crossed here.”

  The old man looked from one to the other.

  “If you keep your mouth shut,” Gamble said, “there’s another three bucks in it for you when we come back this way in maybe a week.”

  “Deal,” the ferryman said, and spat tobacco into the water.

  Weathers reached into his pocket and handed over three silver dollars, which the ferryman took with his left hand and dropped into the breast pocket of the overalls. Then he dropped the gate on the ferry.

  He helped Anise step up onto the ferry with his right hand.

  “You others can load the animals,” he said roughly.

  “You can take all of us?”

  “We’ll find out, won’t we?”

  Gamble led his horse, a big dappled gray, onto the ferry, and the two pack mules followed. Then Weathers brought his horse, a chestnut, and Anise’s strawberry roan. Although Weath
ers had urged his niece to purchase a sidesaddle, she would hear none of it—where they were going, she said, she would have to ride like a man.

  After all were aboard, the ferryman raised the gate and began winching the ferry across the river, the water piling against the upstream side.

  When they were nearly halfway across, Gamble began unbuttoning his uniform.

  “What are you doing?” Anise asked.

  “Getting rid of it,” he said as he stripped the jacket off, revealing his bare torso. “I’m damned tired of it, and tired of people asking about what it was like in Cuba. Figure this is a good place to retire it. When old Joe Shelby and his Iron Brigade crossed the Rio Grande on their way to old Mexico after the war, he sank his battle flag in the river. That was a ways from here, but it’s the same river. Seems like a good time to do the same with this.”

  He held the jacket out over the water, then dropped it. The khaki floated on the green water for a few moments as it was swept downstream, then slipped under, giving a final flash of yellow from one of the cuffs.

  “Remember the Maine,” Anise said. “And to hell with Spain.”

  “To hell with William Randolph Hearst,” Gamble said. “It was his war, not ours. Free Cuba was just a slogan, like they use to sell soap or tonic. In this case, it was used to sell newspapers.”

  Then something splattered into the water a few feet away.

  “What was that?” Anise asked, just as the report from the rifle reached them.

  “Get down,” Gamble said, pushing her toward the gate.

  “Who the hell is shooting at us?” the ferryman asked.

  “Don’t know,” Gamble said, pulling Weathers down next to his niece. “You two stay put.”

  He glanced over the gate and saw a man standing on the gravel bank, a black horse near him, working the lever on a Marlin rifle.

  “Can’t you return fire?” Weathers asked.

  “Not with a shotgun,” Gamble said. “Too damned far.”

  Another round took a bite out of the top of the gate.

  “He’s not a bad shot,” Gamble said. “You two get flat.”

  Gamble ran to the ferryman and began helping pull the long wooden lever that ratcheted the craft across on the heavy rope that stretched from bank to bank.