“I suppose you’re going?”
“It won’t be too much longer before the snows set in and you won’t be shipping any ore until spring. You won’t really need me. Anyway, maybe I’ll drift back in this direction in a few months.”
“You know you’re always welcome, and you’ll always have a job with the Double Slash Mining Company.” Macauley smiled. “I don’t blame you for not wanting to miss a chance to visit with your family.”
“Yeah. Somehow those holidays usually wind up being sort of special.”
* * *
Los Angeles had been little more than a village surrounded by farms and ranches the first time Luke had been there, a few years after the war. It had grown slowly, so that on his subsequent visits the place really hadn’t changed that much.
With the arrival of the railroads and all the immigration they brought, the sleepy little country town had become a city. Luke wasn’t sure he liked that. He had never cared much for crowds.
He brought his horse to a stop in front of a four-story brick building with the word HOTEL painted in big letters at the top of the side wall. He wouldn’t have wanted the job of climbing up there to paint that sign.
He went inside, rented a room from a clerk who didn’t seem to care for the layer of trail dust on his clothes, then took his horse to a nearby livery stable. The hostler there scratched his head and frowned when Luke asked him about Diego’s.
“A restaurant, is it? There’s some of them Mexican places a few blocks from here.”
“It’s a cantina,” Luke explained. It suddenly occurred to him old Diego could be dead. He’d been getting well up in years the last time Luke was there, and that was a long time ago.
“Lemme ask one of the other fellas. There’s one of ’em who’s been around these parts for a long time. He’d know if anybody would.” The hostler went out to the corrals behind the stable and came back with a wizened old-timer in a straw sombrero.
The old man’s face lit up in a toothless grin at the sight of Luke. “Señor Smith!” he exclaimed.
The last time Luke was in Los Angeles, he had been calling himself Luke Smith for reasons he’d considered good at the time.
“Is it really you?”
“It’s me,” Luke said as he searched his memory for the old-timer’s name and came up empty. “But it’s Jensen now.”
“Que?” The old man waved the question off, even as he asked it. “It is of no importance. You are still Señor Luke. You remember old Pedro?”
“Of course I do.” Luke clapped a hand on the man’s bony shoulder. “I was asking about your cousin’s place. The city has changed so much I’m not sure where it is anymore.”
“The same place as always, by the river, but there are buildings all around now. The cantina no longer sits by itself next to the grove of trees. Go two blocks west, follow the river toward the sea, and you will find it.”
“Thank you, Pedro.”
A mournful expression appeared on the wrinkled old face. “You will not find Diego there. My cousin passed on several years ago. His granddaughter runs the cantina now. You remember her?”
“Not really, but I’ll stop by and pay my respects. The beer is still good?”
Pedro licked his lips. “Of a certainty, mi amigo.”
It was a beautiful day with white clouds floating in the deep blue sky over the mountains to the north. In most of the rest of the country, people were waiting for winter to arrive and wondering when the first snows would fall. In southern California, the likelihood of that happening was so small, most folks never even considered it.
Luke enjoyed the walk along the Los Angeles River. As Pedro had said, things had changed. Businesses and houses lined the banks of the stream, but a few of the trees from the grove were left, and next to them was the familiar adobe building. Luke smiled when he saw it.
The inside of the cantina was dim and cool, a welcome break from the sun after a walk of several blocks. In the middle of the afternoon, the place wasn’t very busy. Only a few men stood at the bar, and a single table was occupied. The customers were split evenly between Mexicans and gringos.
Behind the bar stood a women with flawless olive skin and a mass of thick, midnight black hair. She wore a low-necked blouse that displayed the lush curves of her body. She looked at Luke, her dark eyes widening with what seemed like recognition. “Señor Luke?”
“That’s right,” he said in Spanish. “I’m surprised you know me. The years have been long ones, with many lonely miles.”
“You are older, but there is still no doubt you are Señor Luke.” Mischief twinkled in her eyes. “The ugly ones, they do not age so quickly.”
He laughed, recalling her name. “Bonita, you always had some sharp-tongued comment for me when I came here. Your grandfather scolded you, but I told him I enjoyed it. In those days, though, you were like this.” He held out his hand about four feet off the floor.
“I have grown since then,” Bonita said.
“Indeed you have.” Under different circumstances, he might have been tempted to see just how much she had grown, but he had known her since she was a little girl and knew nothing like that was going to happen during this visit. However, he could still compliment her. “You have grown very beautiful.”
“My thanks,” she said, looking down at the bar. “You would like a drink?”
“Very much so.”
She drew a beer and set it in front of him. “When you were last here, you were a manhunter. You still follow this line of work?”
“I do.” Luke took a swallow of the beer and found that Pedro had been right. It was still very good and went down cool and smooth. “I’m a little surprised I’ve survived at it this long, to be honest.”
“I am not surprised at all. You were always a brave, tough hombre. That is one reason I am very glad to see you, Señor Luke.”
He frowned a little. “I’m not sure I understand.”
“I am glad to see you because you were always my grandfather’s good friend . . . but also because there is a man here I think you will want to kill.”
CHAPTER 5
“He fancies himself a legendary bandit, like Joaquin Murrieta was supposed to be,” Bonita said a short time later as she and Luke sat at one of the tables in the rear of the cantina, well away from the other customers. “His name is Alejandro Ruiz. He has held up trains and stagecoaches, but mostly he robs stores and lone travelers. He claims to have killed eleven men, but I do not know if that is true.” Her voice hardened as she went on. “What I do know is that he has set his sights on me and is determined to marry me. If I will not comply . . . he says that he will take me, anyway.”
Luke nodded slowly. “He does sound like he needs a stern talking-to.”
“No. He needs killing.”
Luke wasn’t so sure about that. This Alejandro Ruiz might well be a thief, but hombres who boasted of how many men they had killed often lied about that. It was possible Ruiz hadn’t been responsible for anyone’s death.
On the other hand, he might be every bit as bad as Bonita painted him.
There was only one way to find out, Luke supposed. “Where will I find him?”
“Here. He will be in tonight. He promised—or rather, threatened, as far as I am concerned—that he would be here to see me.”
Spending more time at the cantina in the company of the beautiful young Bonita appealed to Luke. Having collected that $800 bounty in Bakersfield, his finances were in good shape for the time being. Even if Ruiz didn’t show up that night, Luke could afford to linger in Los Angeles for a while and take care of the problem for the granddaughter of his old friend . . . whatever that solution turned out to be.
The afternoon passed pleasantly, with Luke and Bonita sharing memories of old Diego and earlier times when Los Angeles had been a sleepy little village instead of a bustling town. Bonita remembered those days, although she had been very young at the time.
She also kept Luke’s mug full of excell
ent beer, and after a while she retreated to her living quarters in the rear of the cantina and prepared a plate of tortillas, frijoles, and highly spiced beef for him.
“Keep feeding me like this and your other customers will get jealous,” he warned her. “Also, I may never want to leave.”
She grinned. “That might not be a bad thing.”
He thought there was a faintly seductive note in her voice and reminded himself again that he had no intention of getting romantically involved with her. He wasn’t old enough to be her grandfather, but he was certainly old enough to be her father!
He paced himself so the beer didn’t get him drunk. The food helped with that, too, keeping him clear-headed as evening fell softly over southern California. The cantina had gotten busy enough that Bonita had to work at the bar serving drinks, along with her bartender, a stocky, middle-aged man who worked efficiently despite seeming to be half-asleep part of the time.
Luke stayed where he was at the rear table, turned in his chair so he could stretch his legs out and cross them at the ankles. He leaned back and tipped his hat down a little over his eyes, but not so much that he couldn’t see everyone who came in. His eyes partially closed, he remained watchful.
After an hour or so, Alejandro Ruiz came in. Bonita had described him, but Luke didn’t really need that to recognize him. The young man’s air of casual cruelty and arrogance was enough.
Ruiz was lithe and lean, dressed like a vaquero in tight trousers that flared at the bottom, a loose, colorful silk shirt, and a flat-crowned hat. He carried a pearl-handled revolver in a low-slung holster on his right hip. He was a bit of a dandy, and often men like that weren’t really the dangerous hombres they made themselves out to be.
Luke had a hunch that wasn’t the case with Ruiz. His cold-eyed gaze that swept around the cantina was as flat and deadly as that of a snake. His eyes didn’t linger on Luke. The dark, well-worn trail clothes, the old hat, and the casual attitude marked the gringo sitting in the rear corner as nothing more than a saddle tramp. From where Ruiz had paused just inside the entrance, he couldn’t see the pair of Remingtons Luke wore.
Luke glanced at the bar. Bonita stood behind it, her expression a blend of anger and fear as she watched Ruiz swaggering toward her. Her eyes flicked toward Luke as if to let him know this was the man she had told him about. He nodded his head just enough to tell her he understood.
The men sitting at the tables watched Ruiz nervously as he crossed the room. Those at the bar moved aside to give him plenty of room, but Luke noticed they tried to be unobtrusive about it . . . as if they didn’t want him to notice and get angry.
Ruiz had thrown a scare into those folks, all right.
“Bonita, muy bonita,” the self-styled bandit greeted her with a cocky grin. “Have you thought about my proposal? I told you I would come tonight for your answer.”
She hadn’t mentioned that part to him, Luke thought, but he supposed it didn’t matter.
“I’ve already given you your answer, Señor Ruiz,” she said stiffly. “I have no interest in being your wife . . . or anything else to you.”
“But I can take you away from this squalid little cantina and give you a rich life!” He waved his hands at their surroundings.
“I grew up in this squalid little cantina, as you call it,” she snapped. “This is my home. I have no wish to leave it . . . especially to live with a man as cruel as you.”
“Cruel?” Ruiz’s mouth tightened. “I do not believe you know anything of true cruelty, little one. But I can teach you if you wish.”
Luke stood up without moving the chair back and causing its legs to scrape on the floor, uncoiling smoothly and silently. Ruiz, thinking no one in the cantina would dare to defy him, was ignoring everyone except Bonita. He didn’t know anyone had moved up behind him until he heard a soft footstep.
That footstep was quickly followed by Luke saying, “The señorita told you she’s not interested, fella. Maybe you should listen to her and get out of here.”
Ruiz stiffened but didn’t turn around. After a couple heartbeats, he said, “I think I hear a little Chihuahua dog yapping. That little dog should run away while it still can.”
“There’s only one dog here,” Luke said, “and it’s a dirty yellow mutt.”
Ruiz’s pride couldn’t stand that. He whirled around, hand stabbing toward his gun. For all he knew, the man behind him already had a gun drawn, but Ruiz’s confidence was such he believed he could turn, draw, and fire before his enemy could get a shot off. He was fast—fast enough to clear leather with that pearl-handled gun before both of Luke’s Remingtons centered on his chest and belched flame.
At that relatively short range, the .44 slugs that slammed into Ruiz’s body drove him against the bar with such force that he almost bent double backwards over the hardwood. As he tried to straighten, the gun in his hand went off and smashed a bullet into the floor at his feet. He turned, caught at the bar with his free hand in an attempt to hold himself up and failed, sliding down to lie in a crumpled heap at the brass rail along the bottom.
Luke kept his thumbs on the Remingtons’ hammers, ready to cock and fire again. He stepped closer and kicked the pearl-handled gun out of Ruiz’s limp fingers. It slid away. Ruiz gasped and coughed and looked up at Luke with blood trickling from the corners of his mouth.
“I hope there really is a bounty on you, amigo,” Luke said. “I just spent two whole bullets on you. But even if there’s not . . . like a friend of mine told me, you needed killing.”
Ruiz’s eyes started to turn glassy. His head slumped to the floor.
Everyone in the cantina stared in awed silence at Luke and the man he had just shot. Even the sleepy bartender seemed wide awake. Excited murmurs began to rise.
Bonita found her voice. “Everyone saw him draw first, Luke. There will be no trouble with the law. And although I do not know for sure, I believe there are several rewards for Ruiz. As I told you, he has robbed trains and stagecoaches. The men who own such things do not take robbery lightly.”
“No, they don’t,” Luke agreed. He holstered one of the Remingtons and began replacing the expended round in the other.
Bonita reached under the bar, brought out an envelope, and placed it on top. “I have this for you, as well.”
Luke frowned. “What’s that?”
“It looks like a letter that came for you, addressed to you in care of my grandfather.”
“How long has it been here?”
“It arrived only last week, from a place in Colorado called Big Rock.”
Big Rock! That meant Smoke. But why had his brother sent a letter to him here?
The answer came to Luke as he reloaded the other gun. The last time he’d written to Smoke, he’d been up in northern California. Smoke would know that Luke seldom stayed in one place for very long, so if he wanted to get in touch he might have sent notes to several places Luke had mentioned in the past, thinking that he would stop at one of them sooner or later.
It was a pretty haphazard way of getting in touch, but when somebody was on the move as much as he was, it was just about the only way.
He picked up the envelope and tore it open. What he read confirmed his hunch. Smoke explained that he was sending several letters in the hope of one of them finding Luke. The purpose of the message was to extend an invitation. It seemed that Smoke and Sally were taking a trip to Tucson for Christmas, and they wanted Luke to join them there if he could, and if the letter reached him in time.
“What is it?” Bonita asked. “Trouble?”
“No. At least I hope not.” He thought about the times he and Smoke had gotten together over the past few years. A couple visits had involved holidays, and some had come at other times of the year, but the one thing they all seemed to have in common was that hell had a tendency of busting loose whenever two or more Jensens found themselves in the same vicinity.
Despite that, after having been estranged from his family for so long and finally real
izing how much he had missed, Luke was no longer avoiding Smoke and Matt, their adopted brother. Smoke’s letter had also mentioned old Preacher.
It would be good to see all of them, Luke decided, and there was no reason in the world for him not to take a ride over to Tucson.
And maybe there was a good reason for him to get out of Los Angeles as soon as he settled things with the law regarding the dead bandit lying a few feet away. Luke saw the way Bonita was looking at him with a mixture of hero worship and something else in her eyes, and he figured the sooner he got out of there, the better.
He was only human, after all, and there was only so much temptation he could withstand . . . especially when it came in such a beautiful package!
Bonita looked at him and sighed sadly. “You are leaving, are you not?”
“I reckon I am.”
CHAPTER 6
Preacher hadn’t been in San Antonio for a good number of years. The first time he’d visited the city, Texas had still been part of Mexico. Not long after that, however, those contrary Texicans had gotten tired of putting up with the Mexican dictator Santa Anna and decided to hell with that. A lot of dead folks later, it was the Republic of Texas.
Of course, there were some who said that Sam Houston and the other leaders of the revolution had been angling to become a part of the United States all along, and a few years later, that was what happened. Texas was the Lone Star State and had been ever since.
Preacher ambled along past the chapel of the old mission where a relative handful of Texans had stood off Santa Anna’s whole army for almost two weeks, back in ’36, before falling to those overwhelming odds. A part of Preacher would have liked to have been there, fighting alongside those doomed devils, but then he never would have had all the adventures that had come his way since then.
He never would have met Emmitt and Kirby Jensen, either, or dubbed the boy Smoke. Yeah, his life would have been a hell of a lot different.
He was thinking about Smoke because he had a letter from the youngster in the pocket of his denim trousers. It had caught up to him where he was staying at the Crockett Hotel, having been forwarded from Fort Worth, where Preacher had been previously.
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