Gunpoint

by Giles Tippette

  “Do you agree?”

  “When would you like to run this race?”

  I was thinking of what Wilson had said about the time he’d need to get the black ready. “Today’s the fourth, obviously. What about the tenth? Six days from now.”

  “Oh, no,” he said. “Why, Mister Williams, that’s a Sunday. No, I’m afraid we can’t race on a Sunday. No, no, no.”

  I leaned back in my chair. “Somehow, Flood, I never took you for the religious type. Maybe it’s because of all the robbing and murdering you’ve managed to get done.”

  He smiled that death’s-head smile again. “Has nothing to do with religion, Mister Williams. The bank is closed on Sunday and that’s where the money will be.”

  Well, he’d caught me out. “Then the eleventh.”

  “I thought you were so anxious to get away, return to your home.”

  “I am. But I got to get my horse ready.”

  “Five days is enough,” he said. “The ninth. We’ll run Saturday the ninth at four o’clock in the afternoon.”

  I finally agreed, though I knew Wilson was going to say that five days wasn’t enough. I just had to hope that the Thoroughbred was so much better than Flood’s horse that he could beat him without being in top condition.

  Flood said, “Now as to distance. Seems you challenged me and custom gives me the right to pick the distance. Is that your understanding?”

  “Seems so,” I said, but I said it reluctantly.

  Flood said, “A mile. One mile.”

  I tried to act surprised, even though I’d known that was what he was going to call. Hell, I would have even preferred a longer race. But I said, “A mile! Hell, a mile.”

  Flood smiled grimly. “Once around the measured track. One mile.”

  “Hell, I don’t know. You’re not going to try and go out and get some long-distance horse, are you?”

  “All that will be in the agreement. I will meet you at the bank day after tomorrow. Ask for Mister Sloan. He’s the president. We’ll meet at ten o’clock and papers will be drawn and your money will be put up. By the way, I assume you will have to wire for the money. You should see to that as quickly as you can.”

  I held up my hand. “Just hold up a minute. You said, something that sounded like my money was going to be put up. What about your money?”

  He stared at me. “I’m not going to put up any money. Or I should say, I’m not going to put up any more money. I’m putting up an equal amount with yours, the money you cost me. That’s my thirty-two thousand dollars.”

  I had figured that was going to be the way of it, but I was still looking to come out with a little extra. I said, “Hell, you’re crazy! I ain’t putting up my money against nothing on your side! What the hell would I be racing for?”

  Flood brought his cane to between his knees and rested both hands on it. “I expect you know what you’d be racing for, Mister Williams.”

  I knew what he had in mind, but I stared at him for a long time like I was turning it over in my mind. I said, “Peace?”

  He nodded slowly. “If I win I collect the money from the bank and we are quits. If you win you take your money back and I warrant that my search for vindication is over.”

  “Does that mean the same thing as the feud is over?”

  “Yes.”

  “No more threats, no more stock killed, no gunslingers on my ranch?”

  “Yes.”

  “This race will definitely end this?”

  “As far as I’m concerned it will.”

  I sat looking at him. He wasn’t a very pleasant sight with his pasty face and his twisted soul. His twisted body didn’t bother me, it was what was inside his loathsome heart. I said, after a moment, “Hell, I can’t run a race without some kind of wager. Winner takes the other’s horse.”

  His eyes looked amused. Indeed, the whole conversation seemed funny to Mister Flood. I reckoned that was because he didn’t think I knew about Bank Money. I reckoned he thought I was sitting there fat, dumb, and happy thinking I was going to race his long-running strawberry roan with my roan horse. He said, “Why would you want to bet your horse against mine?”

  “Well, Flood, because it’s you. Was it another man I wouldn’t propose the bet. But I figure if you calculate to own my horse after the race, it might keep you from having him shot from long distance during the race.”

  He narrowed his eyes. “Well, the same would apply to you, Mister Williams.”

  “I’m the one proposing the wager. You taking it?”

  I could see him studying on it. Even when you think you’ve got the much better animal, a horse race ain’t never a sure thing. That’s why they go ahead and run them instead of deciding in advance who ought to win and paying off the money on that. A lot of things could happen; something could spook his horse, he could hit a bad stretch of track, he could go lame. But of course, the same things could happen to mine. He looked at me, his chin lowered to his hands, which were resting on the top of his cane. I was just sitting there hoping he’d take my bet and that the black would be ready. I was dying to take Bank Money off Flood’s hands. That would hurt him worse than actually losing five times what the horse was worth, and I figured the horse would bring anywhere from four to six thousand dollars. A top-grade match horse was money in the bank. There was always some fool, somewhere, with more money than he had sense who thought he had a better horse than anybody else. I imagined that Flood got rich off those kind of folks with Bank Money. And horse racing was everything to him. He’d said it, and Wilson Young had said the same thing.

  “Agreed,” Flood said.

  He thought he was racing my roan and he knew Bank Money could beat my colt at a mile. So did I. Except he wasn’t going to be racing the colt.

  There was nothing more to discuss as far as I was concerned. I got up and threw two dollars down on the table to cover my drinks and the use of the meeting place. I looked down at Flood. “Flood, you welsh on this bet and I’ll kill you.”

  He looked up at me. “Brave words, Mister Williams.”

  “You’ve pushed me further than I care to be pushed. I imagine you’ve been getting away with that for a long time. I imagine you pick the sort of man to push, the kind that don’t figure you are fair game. Well, I’ve gone as far as I go. Anything else and I’m going to make an exception in your case.”

  “They have prisons for murderers, Mister Williams.”

  “It ain’t a threat, Flood.”

  His voice followed me as I started out of the dining room. “Don’t forget day after tomorrow. That’s Wednesday, in Mister Sloan’s office at the Cattleman’s National Bank.”

  It was a time and a day I wasn’t likely to forget.

  I left the hotel and walked up the street to the train depot, went into the telegram office, and sent Norris a wire. It said:

  WIRE THIRTY TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS TO

  CATTLEMANS NATIONAL BANK DEL RIO

  TEX STOP WIRE IN CARE MY NAME AND

  MARK FOR RACE ESCROW ACCOUNT STOP

  I marked it urgent, paid for the wire, told the operator where I was staying in case there was a return, and then walked back to the hotel.

  * * *

  Wilson knocked on my door just before six. We sat around and had a drink while I told him about my talk with Flood. He grimaced slightly when I said the ninth, next Saturday. “That’s cutting it mighty close, Justa. Could be that black won’t be up to it by then. Don’t make any mistake, at his best the black would still have trouble with Bank Money. And I don’t think he’ll be at his best by the ninth. Why didn’t you make it the eleventh?”

  Now I grimaced. “I got to get home, Wilson. That ranch ain’t going to run itself and I got a wife I ain’t seen in damn near a month.”

  He put a glint in his eye. “That girl of mine is bringing her sister or cousin. Might be she’d be good for what ails you.”

  I shook my head. “Get thee behind me!” I said. “I might not to even go, as weak a condition as
I’m in.”

  Wilson laughed and finished his drink. “Bet you supper tomorrow night that you break down.”

  “The hell with that,” I said. “It’s about time you bought anyway.”

  “You’ll break down.”

  “No.”

  “You ain’t seen the sister.”

  “Or the cousin. Or whatever she is.”

  Even though Wilson was hitched out front, he walked around to the livery stable with me to get my horse. It was after six and the night stable boy had come on duty. Since he was the one I generally dealt with, my comings and goings usually occurring in the evening, I knew him better than the day stable man. I’d always been pretty free about tipping him, and I flipped him two bits and asked him to saddle my horse and bring him out. He caught the coin in the air and went racing back. He was a nice kind of a kid, about seventeen or eighteen. He’d told me his family owned a half farm, half ranch outside of town and he was working at the stable to get some cash money. His name was Tom, and he’d done a good job of taking care of my livestock, rubbing down the roan and currying him. The black hadn’t been there long enough for the kid to get to know him, but he thought a power of the roan.

  He brought the colt out. “Here he is, Mister Williams. Boy, howdy, that’s a fine horse. Lord, would I love to own a horse like that someday!”

  Wilson and I walked away smiling, me leading my roan. Wilson said, “By the time I was that kid’s age I’d already robbed at least two banks.”

  “I don’t see how you are still alive.”

  “It ain’t because a lot of folks didn’t try and get me not to be alive.”

  We got to the front of the hotel, he unhitched his horse, and we both mounted and started off for the International Bridge that spanned the Rio Grande. As we rode I said, “Do you know most of Flood’s hired hands? The pistoleros?”

  “Most. I guess,” he said.

  “Have any been watching me? I don’t know them by face.”

  “Burt Long was in the saloon the other night when we was playing poker. Standing up to the bar. He’s one of the main ones, maybe one of the ones that Flood has supposedly set aside that money for in case something happens to him.”

  “Who are the others?”

  He thought. “Well, you killed what you might call Flood’s ramrod. That would have been Whiskey Jack. He was about the worst of the bunch. Then there’s Milton Blevins. You know he’s the one is always with Flood. He’s kind of a bad one. I believe,” he added thoughtfully, “I’d rather shoot him when he wasn’t facing right at me.”

  “Who else? You remember I told you about the two with the high-powered, long-range rifles? I think one of them might have had one of those telescopes for a sight.”

  “That would have been Burt Long. He’s got a reputation as a bushwhacker. I couldn’t say about the other one.”

  “How many has he got on regular?”

  Wilson thought. “You got to understand that I ain’t made it a habit to keep up with J.C. Flood’s business. But I think about seven or eight. I can’t call them all by name, but I know one named Curly Knowles and there’s a Mack something. Then, of course, he’s got some vaqueros around the place to hold those herds of cattle he smuggles across. But they’re working cowboys and not pistoleros. Why all these questions? You expecting trouble from Flood?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t know what to expect from him. But I hate to be running around town with a bunch of sonofabitches carrying loaded guns and they know who I am and I don’t know them.”

  “Wouldn’t matter. Ain’t none of them famous for fair fights. They’re not going to come at you one at a time, and they damn sure ain’t going to come at you head-on.”

  I didn’t much care for what I was hearing. Flood’s men sounded more like murderers than gunfighters. I said, “What about this fellow Sloan at the bank? We’re going to meet in his office Wednesday morning. Any chance he’ll just hand the money over to Flood?”

  Wilson laughed. “Naw. Sloan, so far as I know, is as honest as any banker. Besides, Flood ain’t nearly the big cheese around here he’d have folks believe. He’s just the crookedest. Lots of ranchers around here got more money than Flood, and some of them nearly made it honestly. Sloan is about as near to an upright citizen as they is around here. Besides, you reckon he’d go against a man that owns a bank himself? Hell, Justa, you are getting spooky.”

  We had crossed over the bridge and were on the Mexican side. A few frontier officers lounged around in wrinkled uniforms and sidearms that looked too big for their scrawny builds. Wilson leaned out of the saddle as we passed and handed one of them a ten-peso note. The officer made a little saluting motion toward his cap. Since the customs toll was one peso a head for crossing into Mexico, I figured I knew where that other eight pesos was going. Wilson said, “I ain’t a big source of revenue for those boys, but I’m steady.”

  “Be handy if you ever needed to get back across in a big hurry. Having them as friends.”

  Wilson clucked his tongue. “You surprise me, Mister Williams. What an excellent idea. Wonder why I didn’t think of that.”

  We passed on through the town of Villa Acuna, which looked to be about as poor as a place can be. Just south of the town we struck a road that turned northeast. Wilson said, “Ain’t much further, let’s kick these ponies up a notch.” We hit a lope, riding down a narrow little wagon road. To each side of us was the country of northern Mexico: sparse grass fighting back greasewood, cactus, mesquite, and cedar trees. The poor country seemed to be the result of either bad luck or the will of God. Just across the river, no more than two miles away, were good pastures running deep in thick grass. Over on the U.S. side I’d figured a man could run a cow for every three or four acres. On the Mexican side I figured it at ten to fifteen acres a head. I mentioned the difference to Wilson. He said, “Overgrazing. They never give the grass a chance to recover, just keep shoving cattle on it.”

  “Maybe they ain’t got much choice.”

  “They really don’t,” he said. “Most of them get hungry faster than the grass can grow. That’s why Mexican cattle are always so damn poor. Lot of Texas cattlemen think it’s all due to tick fever. That ain’t necessarily so. It’s mostly due to the fact there’s more cattle than there’s grass for. That’s why they can be bought so cheap and smuggled into the U.S. side and fattened up. Man can make five or six times on his money. That’s Flood’s game. Course he can’t afford to keep them in quarantine. No grass. Have to feed them hay. And there would go his profits.”

  We rode about a half a mile further and Wilson turned right on a barely visible track. All of a sudden the country commenced to green up. I could see where somebody had been steadily clearing away the cedar and mesquite that would take over a pasture if a man didn’t stay right after it. I said, “We must be on your place.”

  “House is just ahead,” he said. “Next rise.”

  Off to my left in the evening haze I could see a low line of hills, stretching south into a craggy row of mountains. I knew they were a good hundred miles away, but it was odd to be able to see them from the rolling plains.

  We came over the crest of the little rise, and Wilson’s place was just ahead about a hundred yards. It looked something like mine, only smaller. It was a one-story, adobe-brick hacienda with a low, sloping roof made of red tiles and big, barred windows. There was an overhanging porch roof that was supported by big cedar posts. Off to the left and behind was a small barn built out of lumber. Beside it was a small corral. All around the grass was much thicker and heavier, and I could see the same work had been done to keep back the pirate plants like greasewood and bramble and pear cactus. I saw a few cattle, but not many. I said, “So you’re a rancher?”

  He shook his head. “Naw. But I got about a thousand acres. Didn’t need that much but it came with the place. I let my neighbors graze my land in return for clearing it. If they’d do the same with their own places they wouldn’t have the need for mine. But I
’ve give up trying to explain that to them.”

  As we pulled up in front of his hacienda a Mexican boy of about fifteen came running out and took our horses. Wilson said to him, in Spanish, “Put the horses in the barn corral. Be careful with the saddles and the bridles. Do not get the bits dirty. And grain them.”

  The boy nodded and went off. Wilson said, “Damn kid drags the bits in the dirt. Ought to have a dirty bit shoved in his mouth and see how he’d like it. And 1 have to tell him every time to grain the animals in the evening. Dumb kid.”

  “Why do you keep him around?”

  He gave an embarrassed smile. “He’s Evita’s brother.”

  I said, “Ah ...” Then I glanced toward the barn corral. It was empty. “Where’s the black? In the barn?”

  “No. I’ll show you.”

  He led me between the house and the barn and then around the far side of the barn. There was a little fenced-in trap of about five acres with several horses in it. One of them was the black. We came up and leaned our arms over the top rail of the fence. Wilson said, “I didn’t want him just standing around. Want him to get to playing around with these other horses.”

  Even as we watched, the black and a dun-colored horse made a playful nip at the other’s neck and then both of them galloped away. It was a pure pleasure watching the black run. Wilson hadn’t reached his mane yet and, even galloping, he was going so fast it just flowed out in the wind. I said, “My Lord, that horse can move.”

  “He’s a sight, ain’t he? I put them in the barn at night. Or rather my main charro does. At least the black always gets put up. But he needs to run around, not stand in a stall.”

  The Thoroughbred was at least a hundred yards from me, but he still stood out from the other horses like the quality he was. Not that Wilson didn’t have good animals; he did. But they were like my roan, good, dependable all-purpose working horses that had superior speed, but nothing compared to the Thoroughbred. Of course the black wouldn’t be worth a damn on a working cattle ranch. He’d be ideal to breed up your herd with if he hadn’t been cut, but as he was, he was perfect for just one thing—running fast as hell over a measured course.