The Texas Front: Salient

by Jonathan Cresswell

  Then an explosion from inside Villa’s locomotive blasted it apart and half of the freight loco with it.

  The freight loco – or what was left of it – derailed and slammed into the ground, half-seen in the cloud of smoke, soot, and debris. The passenger cars followed it, tumbling, wooden slats flying, window glass twinkling in the air. Onrushing, the heavier ore cars pulverized them and punched them aside, then derailed in their turn. Clouds of yellow dust billowed out, spread, and began to settle.

  Not a single car was left on the rails.

  “Done it, by God,” said Painewick with relish. Hicks would have whooped in triumph; but Hicks lay unconscious across the front passenger seat, and that dampened Emmet’s own exultation. He’s a good man, don’t want to lose him.

  “That dressing will not hold,” said Idar. “Help me get his shirt off and tear that up... Do you know where the aid station is for the 3rd Volunteers Division?” she asked Painewick. He nodded. “Can you get us there before the Martians arrive?”

  “Miss, I can leave them in my dust,” said Painewick. “Half an hour, I promise.” He threw the car back into gear and accelerated, finding a track and turning west onto it.

  Cycle 597,845.2, West of Minefast 31.01, South Texas

  Taldarnilis studied the imaging as the raised dust cleared. All of the vehicles appeared inoperative. The 92-12 compound had scattered over a large area. It would be a day’s work to collect it, even assuming some of the vehicles might be salvageable, and there were three prey forces converging upon them. It opened a communications link.

  “Gantaldarjir.”

  “Yes, Commander!”

  “This expedition is terminated. Cease efforts to secure the watercourse crossing. We will no longer require its use. All groups! Withdraw immediately to the north and seek out an undefended crossing point. Continue to withdraw to the holdfast.”

  July 1912, Laredo, Texas

  The thunderous explosion had brought Lang and Villa clambering up to the roof, despite the risk. As they emerged, Lang thought bleakly that he’d prefer dying from a point-blank heat ray to what a man looked like after a spider got through with him... But no towering tripod was waiting there to burn them down. Lang’s eye followed the rail line out to a pillar of smoke several miles east. Tripods clustered around it, looking for all Lang knew like a crowd of spectators at a road accident.

  As the two men studied them, Lang became aware of the quiet in the town. Fire crackled in the building next door, but the noise of battle had stopped. A tripod slouched northward just outside the town, joining up with others that were moving off that way.

  “They’re leaving!” cried Lang, dizzied with relief. “Otto was right! With the train wrecked, they no longer need the bridge.”

  “Well,” muttered Villa. He scrubbed at his face with his palms. “It seems we have not lost after all. Those gun flashes further behind the diablos, they are your allies approaching?”

  “Yes. French tanks and Mexican artillery batteries. And the rest of IX Corps can’t be far behind!” Lang wanted to dash below and inform anyone still in contact, but he just needed a moment first. His heart was hammering as though it had just started up again... It won’t be today, then. Not for me, at least. Just for plenty of others.

  “Then, Captain, let us watch a while to make sure the diablos are truly retreating, and discuss my own withdrawal from your country. For some friendships forged in battle last a lifetime, and some end along with their mutual enemy.”

  Lang looked over to Villa’s shrewd expression. “Ah. You don’t trust General Huerta?”

  “I might trust him if I had the Division del Norte with me,” said Villa wryly. “I have less than three hundred men. I will not allow them to be brought under his guns. There are many rumors about Huerta – that he is out of favor with Diaz, that he wishes to replace Diaz, that he will throw his lot in with Madero. I will preserve my force until we see what the real tale is to be. With your permission, Captain, I will assemble all my men and lead them south back into Nueovo Leon.”

  “Getting some distance on him?”

  “Indeed. Also, I will follow the diablos and make sure they retreat to their stronghold. You know, Captain, I can keep watch on them there and warn you of their movements. You may not be surprised once again.”

  Lang smiled. “Yes, you can go, General. I would have said so anyway... but strategic warning would be very welcome.”

  Villa bowed. “Vaya con Dios, Captain Lang.”

  “Good hunting, sir.”

  July 1912, East of Laredo, Texas

  They were two miles out of Laredo when Hicks recovered consciousness and began pawing at Jovita’s arm. Emmet noticed from his seat at the back of the car; he’d settled there – after reloading his Colt out of the belt loops – to keep an eye on the so-called priest sitting opposite him.

  Of course, it made things a bit odd that the priest had given him back the Colt in the first place. Emmet sure hadn’t thought to spare time to go back and look for the piece...

  “Hold up, Eddie!” cried Jovita. Painewick stopped the car in a cloud of dust. Emmet hunched forward over the seat. “What is it, Hicks?”

  “Got some things to settle – before we rejoin an army, with all those rules, and MPs, and such.” Hicks was able to speak, but barely. Emmet didn’t want to think about what would happen if the man tried to stand up.

  “Hicks, we need to get you to that aid station right–”

  “I know that, I’m the one who’s been shot here. I guess that makes it my call too, though, don’t it?”

  Emmet scratched his head. “Never really thought of it that way, but... okay. Make it fast.”

  “We need to do something about him.”

  de Gama was impassive in the face of English he probably didn’t grasp, but Emmet had an odd feeling that the man would be the same if they were speaking Spanish. “No. Wait until they hang him. He’s in custody, and that means he stays alive.”

  “Not what I meant,” said Hicks. He wet his cracked lips. “Emmet, you saw those people in that boxcar. And those Martians aren’t beat proper yet. When they go back home, back to Mexico – if they can’t get trusties to work for ’em and keep stock, they’ll go back to rounding folks up and eating them again. I don’t want that. Those trusties make me sick – but that car was worse.”

  “He does have a point,” said Jovita. “And de Gama, whatever he is, is no man of cruelty. I am not even sure we can judge him at all.”

  “Do you really think he’d go back to them? Keep them eating animals, not people?”

  Hicks managed a grin. “Whyn’t you ask him?”

  “Huh. All right.” Emmet switched to Spanish. “de Gama, or whatever you call yourself – if you were given a choice, would you return to serve the Martians?”

  “Of course I would,” said the priest without hesitation. “I have no purpose here otherwise. Not any longer.”

  “But they’d just burn you down if you walked up to one...”

  “Perhaps. Or they may take me for food, and then I may have time to regain my... connection with them.”

  Emmet couldn’t help but be fascinated. “What’s that like?”

  “Lawman, you cannot conceive it, no more than I could have once. To be a tiny part of an entity so much greater... They must be terribly old. Older than Earth, older than the Fall. Wise beyond compare. And merciless, yes. But for us to accuse them of it is as though... an ant you trod upon accused you of not following its trail like another of its kind. Their purpose is greater than that.”

  “Jovita, what’s your take?”

  “I say yes, and quickly. We have everything we came for.” She lifted a handful of the Martian pendants. “I have what I wanted – freedom. We can spare him one of these. The third is spoken for... But he was a part of that.”

  de Gama smiled thinly. “Indeed. That Ranger said that unless I picked up that old revolver, I should be better off staying aboard. So I did.”

  “
Doesn’t it bother you that we killed your boss?”

  “It was his time,” said de Gama in a voice as empty as a tomb. “I do not think he was brought to the light. In the end, he saw avarice and power in the Masters, not cleansing and glory.” He shrugged. “Even angels must work with the tools to hand.”

  “Right. Jovita, it’s up to you.”

  Idar weighed the pendant in her fingers a moment, then passed it over the seatback to de Gama. “Take this. And some food, a canteen–”

  He bowed over the object. “Not necessary. I shall find what I need on the way. Go help your friend; it is not yet his time.” He slipped over the side of the car, turned, and strode off southward. And he did look like a hermit or a holy man in that moment; ragged, but illuminated from within.

  “Eddie, you best not say anything about a priest to anyone,” said Emmet after a pause.

  “What priest?”

  “Good man. Let’s go.”

  Chapter 20

  August 1912, San Antonio, Texas

  “Eyes right!” bawled a sergeant. A brass band struck up The Star-Spangled Banner for the fifth time that day.

  Willard Lang stood among a crowd of civilians lining Chavez Boulevard ten deep, hemmed into both sidewalks to allow the wide column of troops to march past. His uniform gained him space and obvious respect, but he felt out of place. It wasn’t his choice; General Funston, up on the reviewing stand along with the governor, had forbidden Lang from joining them that morning. “People will be watching, Willard, and taking note. I shouldn’t be there either – but these men fought well, and lost comrades. They deserve recognition. If I do get recalled to Washington, I ought to at least leave IX Corps with a sense of accomplishment. They may need it. Perhaps it will be the only thing they have to hand, if the material losses are not made up.”

  The men marching past Lang – tankers from the 80th, Cronkhite’s ‘tank division’ – certainly looked accomplished. Most of their vehicles were in too poor shape to risk trundling them down city streets, but the crews were in high spirits. The ranks were thinner than they ought to be, of course. Men were flocking to be picked as replacements. Lang wondered grimly if his own unit’s heavy losses at Albuquerque had filled out as fast... But if people lost their will to fight, it would all be over.

  Infantry marched by, their nearly-useless rifles sloped at shoulders, from a regiment of the 83rd Infantry Division that hadn’t even been engaged. Lang couldn’t begrudge them anything. If there’d been no tanks – or if all the tanks had been destroyed, and Martian tripods advancing on this city – those men would have thrown themselves into the field, fought, and died. That might still happen. It was part of Lang’s job to see that it didn’t.

  Units from the 78th and 5th Texas divisions were conspicuously absent. The logjam of reorganizing them after the 40-mile pursuit – a couple of tanks had actually made it as far as Laredo, which had to be a distance record – was still going on. Some of the men had already gone north on troop trains, but tanks and guns were still trickling in as they were salvaged and recovered, and were being shipped out to follow them.

  There was a counterattack underway at Memphis that made the fighting in Texas look like a skirmish. Lang doubted either division would make it north in any time to contribute to that, and it troubled him.

  Also, anyone from the 7th Texas and 49th divisions had to be separated in the parade. They still didn’t get along too well...

  But there was no way he’d try telling that to the exuberant crowd around him. It was as though Sherman had suddenly turned tail and left Atlanta untouched, or the Alamo had held out. The Martians were gone! They’d forced their way into Texas, gotten a bloody nose, and been promptly repulsed. In four months. With French and Mexican help. Well, people were excited; they weren’t thinking of little details like that.

  And if they weren’t aware of the cost, the next group of marchers changed that. The remaining effectives of the 608th Tank Battalion had chosen to march as a unit, and in recognition of their extraordinary effort and loss, were allocated the space they would have needed at full strength. Lang forced himself to count them as they passed.

  Seventy-six men marched in an area that should have held three hundred.

  General Slater wasn’t among them, or among the rest of the 3rd Volunteers, or among anyone. Lang had been told he’d been killed trying to move a cal fifty. Might have been one of the ones that the LRSC turned over from the refitted cars... But it had stopped a trainload of ore. He didn’t know what they wanted it for, but they’d obviously wanted it very badly. How much damage could the Martians have done with that?

  The crowd grew noticeably quieter as the 608th’s survivors marched by. Perhaps deliberately, a brass band followed afterward. People remembered themselves, and as the band struck up The Yellow Rose of Texas, they even resumed cheering.

  A short distance from Lang within the crowd, men started bawling their own lyrics. “Hurrah for Fearless Freddie, who taught Ninth Corps their drill; He sent those Martians packing, while Washington stood still!”

  Some continued singing even after the band moved out of earshot. Nearby, a couple of civilians carrying satchels and notebooks pushed past onlookers, moved up to the men still singing, and spoke to them. One turned and pointed at Lang.

  They rushed at him in a body: reporters. “Captain Lang! Jeff Talbot, the Post. We have reports of guided rockets knocking out Martian tripods! Using their own wire! How did you manage that?”

  “I can’t say,” Lang answered, truthfully enough. “Our heavy weapons are supplied by IX Corps.”

  “Aw, they don’t have anything like that! I have a pal in the Washington bureau, he says they’re supposed to have all that stuff locked up out east. Well, you sure showed them!”

  “Please don’t print that.”

  “What? It’s a great story! ‘You Won’t Believe How Texan Ingenuity Showed Up Foggy Bottom’s Best’!” The man ducked away, scribbling.

  A group of the French wheeled tanks rumbled by just then, saving Lang further indignity as the press rushed to scrutinize them. He faded back into the crowd, shooting a worried glance toward the reviewing stand.

  Jim Wade had more ammunition now than when he’d commanded IX Corps.

  August 1912, Austin, Texas

  Emmet Smith knocked twice at the closed door to the governor’s office. “Come in!” sounded Colquitt’s voice. Emmet entered; seated in the room were Colquitt, Francisco Chapas, and another man, tall, with pomaded hair parted in the middle and a bushy mustache – an old-fashioned look, almost Victorian.

  “Come in, come in. Close the door,” said Colquitt genially from behind his desk. “You know Francisco, of course... This is Henry Lane Wilson, the ambassador to Mexico. Ambassador, meet Special Ranger Smith.”

  Wilson nodded tightly from where he sat to Colquitt’s right. “Heard good things about you, Smith.”

  “Ambassador.” Emmet walked to the chair that Colquitt gestured to. “I’ve done some work, yes. Had some help with it.”

  “Let’s get that spoken to first,” said Colquitt. He flipped open a wooden case on his desk; it held an automatic pistol. “That’s a brand-new Model 1911. I’ll be presenting it to you later this morning, when we appear before the press. You are to appear suitably honored, yet modest.”

  “Governor, I already have a Colt.”

  “Not like this, you don’t. Latest and best. Do not bind the mouths of the kine, and all that. Of course, it’s just a tool. It’s the man we’ll be honoring. And that’s partly why I’ve asked you here. Partly.” He closed the case. “How’s your fellow Ranger? Hicks, wasn’t it?”

  “He’s doing well, Governor, but he’ll be a fair time healing.”

  “Seems I owe him and you a favor, if not an apology,” said Colquitt. “Francisco, and a few other papers, are putting out the story that he was shot while stopping the theft of some Martian salvage by black marketeers. I’m afraid he won’t get any credit for being inside a Mart
ian base.”

  “Why is that?” asked Emmet; but he realized in the next moment.

  “Because the Martians don’t have guns, and he has a bullet wound.”

  “Ah. Right. Doesn’t seem fair.”

  “It isn’t, and I apologize – I’ll tell him myself when I get the chance. I’ll get Henry to promote him to a Captain. That ought to help. How’s your own wound?”

  Emmet slapped his leg. “Not bad. I can get around well enough, now.”

  “It’s too bad there were no Americans in that group of prisoners. Other than – that woman. It would be better for the public.”

  “There were a couple in that gang of collaborators,” pointed out Emmet dryly.

  Chapas winced. “Do not spread that around.”

  “No, of course not. I get it. Bad for morale.”

  “Governor Colquitt says you are a man of discretion,” said Lane Wilson. “And not a political sort. He has you in mind to assist in... an intervention. I know what’s going on in Mexico, and I gather you do too. Especially when it comes to the Provisional President.”

  “Yeah, I’ve worked for Madero in the past. Met him recently, too.”

  “What you may not be aware of,” said Lane Wilson, “is that the ‘true’ president, Diaz, is losing his grip on the country by the day, and there is no clear contender to replace him. The commander of the Mexican expeditionary force in Texas, General Huerta, has offered to recognize Madero as president and give him military support. The force that Huerta commands will be enough to ensure Madero’s supremacy once it moves into Chihuahua. A number of American interests support this. It would stop the revolutionary fighting in northern Mexico, for one thing.”

  “And secure our southern flank,” put in Colquitt.

  “But that wouldn’t address the rest of Mexico,” said Emmet. “You’d need a national election to settle that.”