by J. T. Edson
Watching the young Texian like a hawk, Alvarez made a correct guess at the thoughts which were passing through his head. With his right forefinger starting to tighten on the trigger, the Paymaster was alert and ready to counter whatever evasive action might be contemplated.
The room’s main door began to open and the barrel of a pistol came into view!
Alvarez saw the movement and the weapon from the corner of his eye!
So did Ole Devil!
There was one difference. The Texian knew that, no matter who might be entering, it would not be one of his friends.
Although Ole Devil did not know how Alvarez intended to ensure their unimpeded departure, he had surmised that the hostility between the two regiments might be utilized in some way to create the necessary diversion. On commenting to the Paymaster about Beatriz’s absence from the stable, he had been informed that she was still in their suite completing the last of the packing. Then, shortly after Alvarez had left, supposedly to collect her, her maid had arrived to ask if she had returned from the ride she had taken.
Still unaware of the exact plot, Ole Devil had guessed what had taken the Paymaster to the hacienda. So he had told his companions to remain with the horses while he went to investigate. He was confident that neither would go against his orders.
‘Get him, Cousin Mylo!’ Ole Devil yelled in his native tongue and dived to his left as he was speaking.
To give Alvarez credit, he responded with the speed of a striking diamondback rattlesnake. He also reacted as Ole Devil had hoped he would.
Speaking sufficient English to understand the Texian’s meaning, the Paymaster concluded that the second gringo posed the greater and more immediate threat. Around snapped the twin barreled pistol, lining towards the point where Alvarez estimated the person holding the other weapon would be. Flame and white smoke erupted from the right hand muzzle and the expelled bullet ripped a hole in the thin paneling of the door.
There was a cry of pain, proving that Alvarez had been correct—and lucky—in his aim. However, in the stress of the moment, he failed to notice that the cry had been feminine rather than masculine in timbre. Nor did he take any notice of the thud made by a body falling to the floor of the passage outside the room. He was too busy continuing with his plan to deal with ‘Smithers’.
Going down, Ole Devil reached for and twisted free his pistol. He was moving with all possible speed, but knew it would be a very, very, close thing. Even as he hit the thick carpet and was turning the Manton forward, the Paymaster’s weapon was swinging in his direction.
Jolted by his landing, although the thick covering over the boards of the floor reduced the force somewhat, Ole Devil kept a tight grip on the Manton’s butt and, having used his left hand to cock the hammer, clamped it firmly on top of his right wrist for added security. There was no time to take a formal aim, so he looked along the barrel with both eyes open. Waiting until the weapon was partially concealing Alvarez’s rage distorted face, forcing himself to ignore the ever increasing menace of the others still potentially dangerous pistol, he squeezed the trigger.
Conscious of the Texian’s weapon pointing at him, the Paymaster was also taking sight and making ready to shoot.
Two lives were hanging in a very delicate balance!
The State of Texas—as it eventually became—had good cause to be grateful to Joséph ‘Old Joe’ Manton of London, England, that day. Such was his skilled craftsmanship that the superior mechanism of the pistol he had manufactured gave it a fractionally lighter trigger pull than the more cumbersome double-barreled weapon. So the Manton spoke first.
Rising at an angle from the muzzle of Ole Devil’s pistol, the bullet connected with the center of Alvarez’s forehead. It arrived just—and only just—in time. Lined accurately and with its trigger on the point of disengaging the hammer, the impact caused him to flinch and slightly turn his weapon.
Alvarez’s lead came so close that it almost grazed Ole Devil’s forehead and he felt the dust it kicked up from the carpet strike his cheek. Peering through the swirling powder’s smoke, he saw the Paymaster pitching backwards.
Coming to his feet, with his left hand flashing to the bowie knife’s hilt, Ole Devil looked to where Alvarez was sprawled supine. One glance told the Texian he had nothing further to fear from that source. Returning the pistol to its belt loop, he darted to the table. Listening for the first sounds which would warn him that the shooting had been heard and people were coming to investigate, he swept the coins back into the pouch. Still moving with haste, he closed and fastened the flap, then swung the saddlebags across his left shoulder. Picking up the dispatch box, he went to the door.
All was silent.
Ole Devil learned later that the whole of the domestic staff had been drawn from the house by the sound of fighting. As Urrea’s suite was at the front of the building, the noise of the shooting had not carried to the rear.
On stepping cautiously into the passage, the Texian discovered the identity of his inadvertent savior.
It was Beatriz Alvarez!
Coming to investigate the delay she had heard her husband and Ole Devil talking. She had tiptoed to the door with the intention of taking the latter by surprise. Instead of helping Alvarez, she had caused his and her own deaths. The Paymasters bullet had lost little of its momentum while puncturing a way through the paneling of the door. Striking her under the right eye, it had still had sufficient impetus to range onwards and burst out of the top of her head.
Any remorse that Ole Devil might otherwise have experienced at having been the unwitting cause of the woman’s death was lessened by the knowledge that she would not have hesitated to contribute to his own demise. Hurrying downstairs, he went through the deserted building and left by the rear door. At first he was alarmed by the sounds of fighting which came to his ears. Then, realizing that his own party could not be responsible for such a volume of noise, he guessed it was caused by the diversion Alvarez had arranged.
Looking worried, Mannen Blaze and Tommy Okasi were standing just inside the open doors of the stables holding the horses. Alvarez’s sergeant and corporal had stayed clear of the fighting and had rejoined the other two enlisted men. Although they were staring at the back wall, they turned their attention to Ole Devil as he was approaching.
‘Here, you four!’ the Texian barked. ‘Go up to the major’s quarters and fetch the last of his baggage.’
For a moment, the quartet hesitated. Then the sergeant gave an order and they went towards the hacienda.
‘Mount up,’ Ole Devil told his companions. ‘Our work’s finished here.’
Five minutes later, while fighting was still raging between the remnants of the Tamaulipa Lancers and the ‘Landero’ Line Infantry Battalion, the three young men were riding north on the first stage of their journey back to Texas.
Author’s Endnote
The reader may wonder, as I did, how Ole Devil Hardin would have dealt with the situation if Major Francisco Alvarez had been no more than he seemed.
Unfortunately, General Jackson Baines Hardin’s as yet unpublished autobiography—which I had the privilege of reading while in Texas to attend Western Writers of America’s 21st Annual Convention—does not offer to clear up that particular point. Although the General was remarkably frank about most of his career, he wrote little about the Urrea affair and none of it is speculative. Nor do such official or private documents belonging to Major General Samuel Houston and Presidente Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna as are available give any greater enlightenment. It is probable that any report made by Ole Devil at the conclusion of the mission was verbal. For obvious political—and possibly moral—reasons, none of them wished to have details of such an assignment committed to paper.
However, if Ole Devil’s previous and subsequent career is any criterion, one may feel sure that he would not have hesitated to carry out his duty in any way possible. No matter what his personal feelings might have been, faced with a potentially serious threat t
o the future security and freedom of Texas, he would have taken any necessary steps—not excluding assassination—to get Urrea.
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More on J. T. EDSON
i Texian: the name given to an Anglo-U.S.-born settler in Texas, the ‘i’ being dropped from usage after the Mexican War of 1846-48.
ii An explanation of why the Texians were driven to rebel is given in YOUNG OLE DEVIL.
iii Playing ‘possum’: the opossum, Didelphis Marsupialis, was famous for its habit of pretending to be dead when frightened or captured.
iv Attaching the twenty-seven and a half inch long sword-bayonet, twenty-three inches of which was a single edged, spear-pointed blade, added an extra two pounds to the Baker Model of 1801’s overall weight. It was not fixed when the rifle was required for accurate shooting at long range.
v Patched lead ball: a bullet which is wrapped in a small ‘patch’ made from cloth or very thin hide to ensure a tight fit in the rifling grooves of the barrel. The .70 caliber Baker fired a patched ball weighing twenty to the pound.
vi Brio escondido: stamina and endurance of a high order.
vii Hessian boots: riding boots originally designed for light cavalrymen such as Hussars. The legs came to just below the knee and had a ‘V’ notch in front.
viii James Bowie was one of the defenders of the Alamo Mission. What happened to his knife, which was made by the Arkansas blacksmith and master cutler, James Black, is told in THE QUEST FOR BOWIE’S BLADE.
ix On December 11, 1835, General Martin Perfecto Cos and eleven hundred Mexican soldiers were defeated and compelled to surrender at San Antonio de Bexar by Colonels Milam and Burleson’s much smaller force. On giving his parole that he and his men would not participate in any further military activity against the Texians, they were all released and allowed to return to Mexico. Cos did not keep his word and subsequently returned to take part in the siege of the Alamo Mission.
x Another reason for the sobriquet was his reputation for being a ‘lil ole devil’ in a fight.
xi A more detailed description of the Japanese techniques and an explanation of how Tommy Okasi arrived in the United States is given in YOUNG OLE DEVIL.
xii There was no large-scale contact between Japan and the Western World until the visits made by a flotilla of the United States’ Navy under the command of Commodore Perry in 1853-54.
xiii The off-set position of the handle was to allow men of small stature to wield such lengthy bows.
xiv Two occidental styles of handling a bow are described in BUNDUKI.
xv For all the Browning Slide Repeating rifle’s advantages, it never achieved the fame it deserved. During the period when he was manufacturing it, between 1834 and 1842, he lacked the facilities for large-scale production. In later years when he would have been able to do so, the development of metallic cartridges and more compact, if less simple, repeating arms had made it obsolete.
xvi Recent research suggests that one of the defenders, Brigido Guerrero, escaped death by convincing his captors that he was a loyal Mexican who had been held prisoner by the Texians.
xvii One such occasion is recorded in THE DEVIL GUN.
xviii Napoleon leg boot: one of knee length, the top higher at the front than the back, as frequently worn by Napoleon Bonaparte.
xix Fannin had not intended to mention the ransom, but was compelled to do so as the other officers were suspicious of Urrea’s motives in offering to accept their parole.
xx Joseph ‘Old Joe’ Manton, a gunsmith of London, England, who was an early maker of top quality pistols and rifles employing the percussion fired mechanism.
xxi Lieutenant Dimmock was later killed while helping to raid Santa Anna’s column as it followed the retreating Republic of Texas’s Army.
xxii What the assignment was is told in OLE DEVIL AND THE CAPLOCKS.
xxiii Tommy gave the formula for making the stain to the Confederate States’ Secret Service during the War Between the States, 1861-65. Belle Boyd, the Rebel Spy—who plays a prominent part in several of the author s Civil War and Floating Outfit stories—made use of it during her assignment told in THE BLOODY BORDER.
xxiv Details of Dusty Fog’s career and abilities as a fighting man are given in the author’s Civil War and Floating Outfit stories.
xxv A more detailed account of the events leading up to and the battle itself are given in OLE DEVIL AND THE CAPLOCKS.
xxvi At ‘Deaf’ Smith’s instigation, the post sutlers kept an eye on the ‘North Texas bunch’ and slipped knockout drops into their drinks when they attempted to stir up bad feelings against General Houston.
xxvii Clip point: one where the back of the blade curves to meet the main cutting edge in a concave arc. As in the case of the modern Randall Model 12 ‘Smithsonian’ bowie knife, James Black made his blade with the arc of the ‘false’ or ‘top’ cutting edge five and a quarter inches in length and as sharp as the main cutting surface.
xxviii A detailed examination of Fannin’s failure to support the Alamo and of other events in Texas at that period is given in Walter Lord’s A TIME TO STAND.
xxix Rio Bravo: the Mexicans’ name for the Rio Grande.
xxx
Soft-shell: a liberal-intellectual radical of the most pronounced kind.
xxxi Presidente Santa Anna later signed the Treaty of Velasco, which admitted the independence of the Republic of Texas and agreed to its territorial boundaries.
xxxii As Serrano had no reason to speak English after leaving Texas, he had forgotten the little he had learned at the time of the events recorded in THE QUEST FOR BOWIE’S BLADE.
xxxiii Chicano: a Mexican settler in Texas, particularly one who supported the rebellion.
xxxiv The use of a saddle boot for carrying a rifle had not yet come into general practice.
xxxv A detailed description of the ‘high cavalry twist’ draw is given in SLIP GUN.
xxxvi The daisho, particularly the shorter wakizashi, was traditionally carried thrust through the warrior’s girdle. Tommy Okasi had had his fitted with belt slings since arriving in the United States, as that made them more easy to carry when riding a horse.
xxxvii How Ole Devil requested repayment for the debt is told in THE QUEST FOR BOWIE’S BLADE.
xxxviii Pastel de cabrito: a pie made of small pieces cut from a kid too fat to be roasted, a little sweet oil and a sauce of chopped perejil, parsley, flavored by eggs beaten in vinegar—or orange juice according to taste—being poured through the holes made in the crust to let the steam escape.
xxxix The majority of ‘Kentucky’ rifles were, in fact, made in Pennsylvania.
xl Badillo’s troop had carried their lances during the ambush as being more suited to their task.
xli Creole: in this context, a Mexican of pure, upper class Spanish bloodline.
xlii Coup des deux veuves: freely translated, the attack which causes two widows.