Webb's Posse

by Ralph Cotton

  Goose looked suspicious. “Why are you being so good to us, Summers?”

  “Because there’s only three of us in here, Goose,” said Will Summers. Wasting no further explanation on Goose, he said to Moses, “As soon as we get free of this place, the truce is off. We’ll settle everything between us. Deal?”

  “Deal,” said Moses.

  “A deal, huh?” Goose spread a wide, sarcastic grin, looking the three possemen up and down. “Like you said, there’s only three of you. What makes you think the three of you stand a chance out there any more than you do in here?”

  “I never said we didn’t stand a chance in here, Goose,” said Will Summers. “Your brother Moses is the one who asked for the truce. We’re just being obliging.”

  Dead silence followed, until finally a slight smile came to Moses’ face. Then a low chuckle, then a laugh, as Summers, Webb and Teasdale joined in. Finally, after looking confused by it for a second, even Goose joined in.

  “You always was one bold, crazy sonsabitch, Summers,” said Moses Peltry. “I almost hate thinking I’ve got to kill you before this is over.”

  “Don’t worry about killing me, Moses,” said Will Summers, still smiling. “You don’t stand a chance in hell.”

  Chapter 22

  Sherman Dahl had spent most of the night hiding in the darkness of the crevices and gullies along the trail toward Punta Del Sol. After he’d escaped with the heavy Gatling gun and its folded stand tied across his horse’s back behind his saddle, he’d stayed as close to the Federale patrol as he dared, just to make sure no harm came to Teasdale, Webb or Summers along the way. Dahl hated having to abandon his companions the way he did, but he’d really had no other choice. The Mexican army patrol had come upon them swiftly and silently in the night. By the time Sherman Dahl could have fired a warning shot, the soldiers were already within a few slim yards of the sleeping men. There was no doubt in Dahl’s mind that Summers, Webb and Teasdale would have made a fight of it. And that fight would have been their last, Dahl thought.

  At daylight, when the patrol entered the town, Sherman Dahl stepped his horse quietly up into the surrounding hillside and lay in watch like a mountain cat. In the thin morning light, he saw the naked, drunken outlaws being herded from the cantina to the old Spanish mission at the edge of town. He saw Summers, Webb and Teasdale also taken there. Then he watched Cherokee Rhodes appear alongside the tall officer in the German uniform on the porch of the large hacienda atop the steep trail. “Good thing I saw you first, Cherokee,” he whispered to himself.

  As the gray mist of morning lifted, burnt away by the hot sun, Dahl saw the supply wagon sitting inside a livery corral, where the Peltry Gang must have left it. Now there were three soldiers standing guard around it. Through the canvas tarpaulin draped over the rear of the wagon, Dahl saw the outline of the ammunition crates. His eyes instinctively followed an imaginary line away from the wagon to the closest point of steep, rocky hillside where he could find cover for himself. Then he unloaded the Gatling gun, affixed it to its stand a few steps back out of sight and checked it over thoroughly.

  Sherman Dahl waited and watched and rested. He sipped tepid water from his canteen as he kept an eye on the comings and goings of Punta Del Sol. In the early afternoon, Cherokee Rhodes and Junior the dog walked out to the corral. Rhodes carried a goat-skin of water that he passed around to the three guards. In a moment, Rhodes and two of the guards left, probably going for their noon meal, Dahl thought, grateful that now there was only one guard to take care of. But then he saw that Junior had found himself a slice of black shade beneath the wagon and dropped down in it.

  “Please get out of there, Junior,” Dahl whispered. “Don’t make me kill you.” He drew the long knife from his boot well and tested its edge with the flat of his thumb. He hoped the dog wasn’t going to be a problem. With the sun reaching the hottest point of the day and heat wavering upward from the dirt streets of the town, Sherman Dahl crawled down from his lofty position and headed for the supply wagon.

  Dahl carried his repeating rifle with him as he snaked downward but stashed it behind a rock when he reached the bottom of the hillside, where his cover ended. He couldn’t take the rifle any farther with him, but he wanted it close by in case he needed it on his way back. He lay behind a brush thicket and watched as three guards dragged one of the scalp hunters from the old Spanish mission to the wide clearing in the center of town.

  “This ain’t fair, damn it to hell!” Comanche Killer Cane shouted. One guard shoved him over near the stone well, where he staggered back and forth, trying to get his footing, his cuffed hands reaching out uselessly in front of him. “You could give a man a fighting chance, you jake-legged bunch of rotten—!”

  His words cut short as the one guard stepped away and the other two raised their rifles and fired unceremoniously. Both shots hit Cane in the chest and drove him backward to the ground. But as the other guard stepped forward again, Cane managed to turn himself over and struggle upward onto his hands and knees, blood flowing freely from his shattered chest. “All right now,” he said in a groggy voice. “Let’s just hold on. You’ve done what you…set out to do.” His voice began failing as his life spilled out into the hot dirt. He tried to say more, but the young soldier drew a short sword from a sheath on his side, grabbed a handful of Cane’s hair and jerked his head up.

  From his position in the brush thicket, Sherman Dahl winced at the sight of the blade passing sleekly across Cane’s exposed throat, leaving a ribbon of spinning blood behind it. The soldier turned loose of Cane’s hair and let him drop facedown in the dirt. He wiped his sword blade across Cane’s naked back and stepped away. Joining the other two soldiers, he slid the sword back into its sheath. Dahl watched the three march single file back to the old Spanish mission. On the supply wagon, the guard had also watched the execution intently. He rubbed a hand on his sweaty throat and whispered the name of the Blessed Virgin under his breath.

  As soon as the three soldiers stepped inside the doors to the old Spanish mission, Sherman Dahl drew his knife from his boot and prepared to make his move. But the sound of a pistol cocking and the feel of the steel barrel tip against his head caused him to freeze. “Make one sound,” Doc Murdock whispered, “and I’ll open your head up all over the ground.”

  Sherman Dahl spread his hands before him, letting the big knife fall from his fist. He lay silent, awaiting the next move in what he knew to be a most deadly game. “Good boy,” whispered Doc Murdock. “Now back up behind this brush. I don’t want to be seen no more than you do.”

  When Sherman Dahl had crawled backward a few feet, Doc Murdock stopped him with a nudge of his pistol barrel. Still whispering, Murdock asked, “Now, who the hell are you? What’s your angle in all this?”

  “I’m one of the four possemen left,” said Dahl, seeing no point in hiding the fact. “The other three are in there.” He nodded toward the Spanish mission.

  “I’ll be damned.” Doc Murdock grinned, shaking his bare head slowly. “I’ll say one thing for you bunch of fools, you don’t give up easy.”

  “You’re Doc Murdock, I presume?” Dahl asked, turning his face around enough to look him in the eyes.

  “Yeah, you presume right,” said Murdock. “But me and my men threw in with the Peltrys after they hit your pig-shit town. So you’ve got no call to have a mad-on at me.” He offered a tired grin. “Anyhow, it looks like both your side and mine are in the same bad spot over there.” He gestured his pistol barrel away from Sherman Dahl and toward the Spanish mission. “Don’t tell me you risked your neck coming down here to save your possemen.”

  “That’s right,” said Dahl. “I’m here to do whatever it takes. What about you? Are you here to free your men?”

  “Me?” Murdock chuckled under his breath. “Hell, no. I got caught off-guard, wild-eyed on peyote and pinned to a young whore’s belly. We was damn near stuck together like dogs. We both dived out the same window. But she landed on the bottom and cou
ldn’t take the fall, I reckon.” He spit. “Anyway, I hope to hell you came here on horseback. I need to get out of here fast!”

  “What about your men?” Dahl asked.

  “What about them?” Murdock retorted. “They’re all old enough to die. They knew what to expect when they started riding with me. Now let’s get going. Show me where that horse is.”

  “Huh-uh,” said Dahl, glancing down at Murdock’s bare feet then back to his sweaty face. “I’m not showing you anything. I came here to get my men, and that’s what I’m going to do.” His hand dropped to the ground and closed around the knife handle. “You want a horse? Sure, I’ve got one hidden up there…. In fact, I’ve got a half dozen horses up there,” he lied. “But nobody rides until this job is finished.”

  Murdock’s hand tightened around his gun butt. “Maybe you’re a little thick, young man,” he said in a harsh whisper, “so let me remind you: I’m the one holding the cocked pistol. You might get a swing started with that knife, but it ain’t going to do anything for you. You’ll still be dead when this hammer falls.”

  “Yep, and you’ll still be here, barefoot and without a horse, Federales making round holes in your belly. Now, either pull that trigger or get ready to help me make a move. I’m not going to lay here in this heat all evening.”

  Doc Murdock considered the situation. He glanced around the edge of their brush cover at the guard sitting on the tailgate of the supply wagon and looking in the opposite direction. “You’ve got guts, young man, I’ll give you that.” He let out a breath, uncocked the pistol and lowered it. “What is it you’re getting ready to do anyway?”

  “I’m getting ready to take out that guard, grab some ammunition for the Gatling gun, then get out of here before they see what I’ve done.”

  Murdock’s eyes lit up. “You’ve got the Gatling gun?” He laughed low and quietly and shook his head. “Lord, man, why didn’t you say so to begin with? That gun is just what we need to get us the hell off the spot here.”

  “Then you’re with me?” Dahl asked.

  “With you? If you’ve got that machine rifle, we’re just like cousins, you and me,” said Murdock. “Tell me what you need me to do.” Even as he spoke to Sherman Dahl, Doc Murdock was busily sizing him up, weighing his chances at dropping this young man along the trail, taking whatever horses and supplies he had and hightailing it out of there. The Gatling gun would be worth taking too, he thought.

  “Just cover my back until I take care of him,” said Dahl. “Then come grab as much ammunition as you can carry. Once we get the Gatling gun loaded, we’ll see what we need to do to get our men out of there.”

  “That’s it? That’s your whole plan?” said Murdock.

  “That’s where it starts,” said Dahl. “We’ll see where it goes from there.” He turned his gaze toward the guard. “Get ready,” he whispered over his shoulder.

  Murdock just stared at him for a moment, wondering if he was serious. “Have you done much of this kind of fighting?” he asked.

  “I’ve done my share,” said Dahl. Without another word, he crawled away on his belly like a lizard, circling wide of the wagon, keeping himself on the guard’s blind side until he got within a few feet from the wagon’s tailgate. Beneath the wagon, Junior stood up and looked at Dahl, causing him to freeze to the ground for a second and close his hand around his pistol butt. But then Junior stepped out from beneath the wagon without a sound, shook himself off and dropped back down in the dirt, facing the guard. This time the dog sat staring at the guard as if intentionally drawing his attention.

  For a moment, Doc Murdock lost sight of Sherman Dahl. But then, as quick as a streak of lightning, Dahl sprang into sight. He came up over the edge of the tailgate, swung an arm around the guard’s neck and jerked him backward onto the hard, sharp point of steel.

  Murdock watched, mesmerized, seeing Dahl rock the blade up and down brutally between the guard’s ribs, making sure it pierced his heart. Junior the dog stared with detached fascination. When Dahl slid the guard forward and pulled the blade from his back, Murdock saw the calmness, the cold deliberation, of Dahl’s movements as he sat the guard back into place on the tailgate and adjusted his hat on his head. Dahl crouched down out of sight beside the wagon and motioned for Murdock to join him. “Damn, boy,” Murdock whispered to himself. “You do know your business, don’t you?”

  As Murdock hurried forward, Dahl had already raised one corner of the canvas tarpaulin. He began grabbing the ammunition crates by their rope handles and dragging them down to the ground. “Get two of them and go,” Dahl whispered. “I’ll get two more!”

  “That’s not enough!” said Murdock, grabbing the two crates by their handles.

  “It’ll have to do,” said Dahl, shooting a quick glance toward the old Spanish mission. “They’ll be coming back soon. We need to cover some ground before they catch on to us.”

  “Anything you say, posseman,” said Murdock. He turned, half carrying, half dragging the two crates toward the brush. Junior stood up from the dirt and trotted off behind him as if following an old friend.

  They slipped into the cover of brush and rock and moved along in a crouch until they came to the base of the hillside where Sherman Dahl had stashed his rifle. Doc Murdock had stopped a few feet in front of Dahl. When he looked back and saw the rifle in the young man’s hands, he silently commended himself for not having tried to make a move on Dahl just yet. He was learning more about this man every step they traveled. He would bide his time. “You’re full of surprises, ain’t you, posseman?”

  “Stop calling me posseman,” said Dahl. He checked the rifle with a serious expression and cradled it in his arm. “My name’s Sherman Dahl.”

  “All right then, Sherman Dahl.” Murdock agreed with a nod, catching his breath, taking advantage of their stopping if only for a moment. “You don’t strike me as a full-time lawman. What are you, a deputy? A town councilman?”

  “Neither,” said Dahl. “I’m Rileyville’s schoolmaster.”

  “You’re kidding?” Doc Murdock stifled a surprised chuckle. “A nice young schoolmaster out here on a manhunt? How the hell did that come about?”

  “I came along because your pals the Peltrys burnt down the schoolhouse. Whatever bounty reward we get, my cut of it goes to rebuild the school.” He nodded at the uphill path before them. “Let’s get going. We’ve got a hard climb.”

  “Right,” said Murdock, yet he made no move toward grabbing the rope handles of the ammunition crate. Instead, his right hand rested on his pistol butt as he wiped a shirtsleeve across his sweaty face. “Only, I was just thinking. What’s keeping me from shooting you right here, leaving these heavy crates where they lie, working my way on up this trail, finding those horses for myself and getting out of here?” He spread a crafty grin.

  “What about helping your men escape?” Dahl asked.

  Murdock shrugged. “I already told you how I feel about them. They knew the risks.” His stare turned sharper, bolder.

  “Then I suppose there’s nothing keeping you from it,” said Dahl, straightening up, letting his right hand poise near his pistol butt, “provided you’re a good gambler.”

  “Good gambler?” Murdock’s brow raised slightly. He still bore the crafty grin.

  “That’s right,” said Dahl calmly. “You’ll be betting on my having told you the truth about there being horses there. You’ll be betting that even if there are, you can kill me so quick I won’t have time to put a bullet or two in you…slowing you down while the Federales come running.” Dahl returned the crafty grin. “It’s a whole lot to be betting on, you have to admit.” His hand inched a fraction closer to his pistol butt.

  Doc Murdock chuckled aloud now, his hand coming up away from his pistol. “It would be at that.” He reached down with both hands, grabbed the rope handles and started off up the path. Junior trotted along close at his heels. “Anyway,” he said over his shoulder, “I don’t want to rim out. I’ve got some unfinished bus
iness with Goose Peltry that needs settling.”

  “Oh?” That was all Sherman Dahl said, but it was enough to keep Murdock talking.

  “Yep. The fact is, I’m going to kill that sucker,” said Doc Murdock.

  “But he’s one of the leaders,” said Dahl. “How do you expect to pull that off? What about his brother?”

  “Ha! I’m not worried about his brother. If Moses wants to jump in, that’s all right too.” Murdock glanced back as he moved ahead. “I suppose hearing something like that surprises the hell out of a man like you, but that’s the cold, hard way things work in this world me and the Peltrys live in.”

  “Yep,” said Dahl, hurrying along behind him. “It does surprise me. But I’m getting more used to it every day I’m out here.”

  At the top of the path, Doc Murdock came upon the Gatling gun abruptly, seeing it sitting back from the edge of the rocky ledge two hundred yards above Punta Del Sol. “I’ll be damned,” he said, out of breath, dropping both ammunition crates. “Talking about gambling…you sure took a big chance leaving that gun sitting out here in full view. Anybody coming along here could have spotted it.”

  “Luckily they didn’t though,” said Dahl matter-of-factly. He also dropped his two crates. Then he walked over to a rock half the size of a saddle, turned it over and picked up the Gatling gun’s black metal firing mechanism. “Of course, the gun wouldn’t have done anybody any good without this.”

  Murdock grinned, once again reminding himself how wise he had been not to kill this schoolteacher too soon. He would have been stuck with a machine rifle without a firing mechanism. But so much for waiting. Now was the time to get out of here. He glanced down at Dahl’s dusty boots, sizing them up as he once again slipped his hand atop his pistol butt. “That was good thinking on your part, schoolteacher,” said Murdock. He looked all around for the horses, but saw none. Looking down at the ground, he saw only one set of fresh hoofprints in the dust.