Falconer's Law

by Jason Manning

  "Buenos noches, Eben," she said, with a tender smile that stole his breath away. "And thank you, from the bottom of my heart"

  Mumbling goodnight, Eben went back to his blankets, put out the lamp, and plunged the cabin into pitch blackness. In spite of his weariness he still had trouble going to sleep, and for a long time he lay there quite still and listened to the sound of Sombra's breathing.

  Chapter 27

  "Riders coming," said Gus Jenkins as he shook Hugh Falconer awake.

  Falconer rolled out of his blankets, lithe and instantly alert. The rest of the brigade was stirring. Dawn was a gray promise of night's demise. Luck and the other squaws were disturbing the embers of the campfires, while the men looked to their rifles. This was a mountain man's second nature. They had no idea who the riders were or what they wanted, but they would not be caught with their guard down.

  "Can't tell yet who it is," admitted Jenkins, standing alongside Falconer and squinting at the distant black specks moving across the amber background of the sun-ripened wild oats that carpeted the valley floor.

  Falconer couldn't either, for the moment—but he had a real good idea. He had not told anyone else about Eben Nall. Some of the men had wondered where their young companion was and what he was up to, but Falconer had kept his lips sealed, and Rube Holly had done the same. Now Falconer had second thoughts. Had he been right to keep the truth from the brigade? All along he had figured there was an excellent chance that Don Carlos Chagres would pay them a visit after his daughter disappeared. Didn't the others have a right to know that there could be big trouble in store for them?

  Guilt was part of the reason why he had kept silent. After all, he'd kept everyone else on a short rope, spouting a long can't-do list, while acting as the willing accomplice in Eben Nall's dangerous scheme to rescue Sombra Chagres. Wasn't very consistent. He realized that and wasn't even sure why he had gone to such lengths to help Eben. Paying for Eben's and Sombra's passage on Captain Shagrue's brigantine was really the least of it.

  As the riders neared, Falconer could see he was right—it was Don Carlos, with Remo and seven vaqueros, and three more men clad in the distinctive green-and-black uniform of the Mexican soldier.

  The presence of Don Carlos meant Eben Nall had succeeded in his venture.

  "I don't like the looks of this," muttered Jenkins suspiciously. "But at least we've got them outnumbered."

  Falconer glanced at Jenkins. "Gus, go around to every man here and tell them I don't want them to start anything."

  "What if those fellers yonder start something?"

  "The men have a right to defend themselves."

  Gus nodded. Clear enough what Falconer meant. The men could shoot only if they were shot at. He lingered to gaze inquisitively at the oncoming riders. "I wonder if this has something to do with the Nall brothers and Doc Maguire."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Well, all I'm saying is, everything's fine and dandy between us and the Californios. Then Eben Nall disappears a couple days ago. And Silas Nall and Doc Maguire didn't come back from Monterey last night like they were supposed to. I noticed they were absent this morning."

  Falconer grimaced. Just what he needed, something else to worry about.

  As Jenkins moved off to deliver Falconer's caveat to the other mountain men, Falconer took up his Hawken rifle and went forward to meet Don Carlos at the edge of camp.

  "We have come to search your camp," said Chagres curtly as he checked his high-stepping stallion.

  "What are you looking for?"

  The haciendero's demeanor was a portrait of cold rage. "For Eben Nall and my daughter."

  "Neither one is here."

  "I will see for myself."

  Falconer's smile was bleak as a high country winter.

  "You implying that I'm a liar, Don Carlos?" He spoke softly, but every man present could detect the iron menace beneath the words.

  "I am Lieutenant Ramirez," said one of the soldiers. "Sombra Chagres has been kidnapped. Don Carlos has reason to believe one of your men, señor, is responsible."

  "If Eben Nall ran off with your daughter, Don Carlos, I reckon she went of her own free will."

  "And you, of course, know nothing about it," rasped Chagres.

  Falconer didn't answer. One thing he would not do, even for Eben Nall, even for a good and just cause like the rescue of Sombra Chagres, was speak a lie.

  "You are the leader of these men," said Ramirez. "As such, I presume you take responsibility for their actions."

  "I do, long as they're part of the brigade."

  "Then you will come with us, Señor Falconer."

  "Am I under arrest?"

  "Is it necessary to place you under arrest, señor?"

  Some of the mountain men standing about the camp, rifles in hand, had edged closer, and they were near enough to hear this exchange. A clatter of hammers being pulled back punctuated the lieutenant's query.

  Falconer whirled. "No shooting, damn it."

  "Don't let 'em take you, Hugh," growled Rube Holly.

  "We'll make a fight of it right here," suggested French Pete Bordeaux.

  "No," snapped Falconer. "I'm going with them."

  Gus Jenkins stepped forward. Face-to-face with Falconer, he cast a distrustful glance at Don Carlos.

  "Don't go with them, Hugh," muttered Jenkins. "That feller there means to have somebody's hide, and that somebody could turn out to be you."

  "Give me your word you'll keep all the men in camp until I get back."

  Jenkins pursed his lips and let go a soft whistle. "Might not be easy, that. In case you haven't noticed, these men have become mighty loyal to you in the past few months."

  "No, it won't be easy. You're the only one who could pull it off."

  "And what if you don't come back, Hugh?"

  Leaning forward, Falconer pitched his voice so that only Jenkins could hear.

  "Then hightail it out of California, Gus, and don't look back."

  "Leave you here on your own stick? These boys won't buy that bill of goods."

  "I've been on my own stick all my life," replied Falconer. "I can look out for myself. I don't need you or anybody else to take care of me. You hear?"

  "Yeah. I hear you."

  Falconer turned back to Ramirez. "I will come with you, Lieutenant."

  Ramirez nodded. "Muy bien. Gracias."

  "I want to search this camp," Chagres told Ramirez.

  Ramirez scanned the brigade's camp. "Your daughter is not here, Don Carlos. With all due respect, I am not willing to start a shooting war to prove the obvious."

  "I will not tolerate insolence, even from you, Lieutenant."

  "You may report me to the governor-general, señor," replied Ramirez, cool and unruffled. "But the one thing you may not do is search this camp. Not while I am present."

  Falconer was beginning to take a liking to Lieutenant Ramirez. The man was fair-minded, hard as nails, and he kept his head in a crisis.

  Chagres was another matter entirely. It was obvious that neither Eben Nall nor Sombra was here. Yet Don Carlos insisted on pressing the issue. Was he mad? With the odds clearly stacked against him, he still wanted to provoke a fight. Falconer watched warily as Chagres teetered precariously on the edge of defying Ramirez—and twenty-five mountain men aching for a good bloodletting before breakfast. One word, and his vaqueros would start the ball rolling. They would ride into the teeth of hell for their patrón. Their loyalty was that unequivocal. They would not back down, under any circumstances.

  In the end, Don Carlos thought better of it. Falconer fetched his horse and moments later was riding toward Monterey with the Californios, leaving a worried bunch of mountain men behind.

  Lieutenant Ramirez informed Falconer that the governor-general wished to see him. Don Luis was not presently in his residence, but rather across the square in the building that housed the offices of state, the old presidio. Falconer was escorted to a room off an entrance hall. The only furnishin
gs were a table and a chair. The single window boasted a grill of ornate wrought iron bolted to the outside. Bars by any other name, mused Falconer.

  Not that he felt like a prisoner—just yet. He had been allowed to keep his weapons. But when he opened the door to the hall, the guard standing outside turned and looked at him with an expression he couldn't fathom. It definitely wasn't an invitation to step out into the hall, and Falconer realized the small courtesy they had shown him in allowing him to keep his pistol and Hawken mountain rifle when you considered he was smack-dab in the middle of a town that hosted probably two hundred soldiers. Falconer closed the door and went back to the table and sat down to wait.

  It was a long wait, but Falconer had more patience than most men. He refused to let himself speculate on what might happen. That was a good way to get your nerves tied up in knots. After a time he took clay pipe and tobacco from his shoulder-slung possibles bag. Someone had built a fire in the room's hearth this morning—although the days were still warm enough as long as the sun was shining, the nights and mornings were quite cool, particularly inside the thick adobe brick walls of this old building. Falconer stirred up the embers and lit the pipe with the glowing end of a stick.

  He smoked the pipe down and waited some more. Several times he heard men running in the hall beyond the door and voices shouting, steeped in urgency. Eben Nall, it seemed, had stirred up a hornets' nest.

  Finally the door swung open, and a grim Don Luis entered. The governor-general was accompanied by Chagres and Lieutenant Ramirez.

  "Señor Falconer," said Don Luis gravely, "it is good to see you again. I only wish we were meeting under more pleasant circumstances."

  "I'm afraid there isn't much I can tell you about Miss Chagres."

  "Not to detract from the seriousness of Sombra's abduction, but we have another matter entirely to discuss."

  Falconer said nothing. The look on the governor-general's face forewarned him. Whatever Don Luis was about to tell him, it wasn't going to be good news.

  With a deep sigh, Don Luis said, "A woman was murdered last night."

  "Who?"

  The governor-general turned to Ramirez. "Lieutenant?"

  "She was a prostitute, Señor Falconer," said Ramirez. "I have only just now learned the details of her death. They are . . . not pleasant."

  "What's it got to do with me?"

  "One of your men killed her."

  Falconer was stunned. But he betrayed no emotion. This was a habit he had acquired through surviving many a tight spot with hostile Indians in the high country. It had proven to his advantage in such situations to keep what he was thinking a secret.

  "Who is the man?" he asked.

  "He calls himself Maguire."

  Doc Maguire! Gus Jenkins had told him that Maguire and Silas Nall had failed to return to camp last night . . .

  "When did this happen?"

  "Last night. In a room behind a cantina not far from here. She was stabbed, more than once. She cried out before she died. Señor Maguire tried to flee. But several men captured him. He seriously wounded one of them before he was disarmed and subdued."

  A furious anger raged inside Falconer's soul. But none of the others could see it flaring behind the mountain man's stoic mask. Again he did not respond. What was there to say? Doc Maguire had been caught red-handed. Falconer felt betrayed. He had trusted Doc Maguire. But he was angry with himself too, for giving that trust. I never learned my lesson, he thought bitterly. Once before, long ago, he had put his trust in other men who had ultimately betrayed him. He had lived to regret it, but only barely.

  He wasn't too sure that he or any other member of the brigade would survive this betrayal.

  Chapter 28

  "Señor Falconer," said the governor-general, "it will prove impossible to keep this crime a secret from the people for very long. Soon all of Monterey—indeed, all of California—will know of it. Do you understand what I am trying to say?"

  "I think I do."

  "Personally, I do not hold you to account for the barbaric act of this man, Maguire. But I am afraid the people will not be so . . . discerning."

  Falconer nodded. "We'll have to leave California immediately. Won't be easy, getting back over those mountains so late in the year. We may have to . . ."

  Don Carlos stepped forward, no longer able to contain himself. Fury crawled across his features.

  "You cannot permit them to leave," he told Don Luis in Spanish.

  The tone of voice Chagres employed rankled the governor-general. "You presume to tell me what I can and cannot do?"

  "I am telling you that this man"—Don Carlos stabbed an accusing finger at Falconer—"and probably all of his followers, are parties to the kidnapping of my daughter."

  "Since this obviously has something to do with me," said Falconer coldly, "I'd be obliged if you spoke English."

  "Of course," said the governor-general. "That is only fair. Don Carlos objects to letting you depart in peace, Señor Falconer. He believes you have knowledge pertaining to the whereabouts of Sombra Chagres."

  Falconer had a real good idea where Sombra and Eben were at this very moment—the cabin by the sea that Padre Pico had spoken of the day he and Eben had visited the Carmel Mission.

  "From what I hear, your daughter had a good reason for running away, Don Carlos," he said.

  Chagres looked to be on the verge of lunging across the table at the mountain man.

  "I ought to kill you where you stand," rasped the haciendero.

  "You could sure try."

  "Gentlemen, please," said the governor-general.

  Chagres glowered at Don Luis. "Are you going to do something about this, or do I have to take matters into my own hands?"

  Realizing that his fate lay in the hands of the governor-general, Falconer watched Don Luis closely. Clearly Chagres had power—enough influence, at least, to make the governor-general consider the warning carefully.

  "I am sorry, Señor Falconer," said Don Luis, "but for the time being I must insist that you and your men remain in California. At least until the matter of Sombra's . . . disappearance . . . is cleared up."

  "Seems like that's just asking for trouble, if the people get worked up about this killing."

  The governor-general shrugged helplessly. "I will have Lieutenant Ramirez place your men under . . . under our protection."

  "That's just a nice way of saying we'll all be under arrest."

  "I would not describe it as 'arrest.' "

  Falconer noticed for the first time that his hands were clenched into fists, and he tried to relax. It wasn't easy. He had never cottoned to folks telling him he could not come and go as he pleased. And he knew full well the buckskinners in his brigade would not meekly surrender themselves into custody.

  "I don't think that's a very good idea," he said. "My men won't give up their weapons without a fight. It's just not in them to do it."

  "Then they will all die," said Chagres with relish.

  "Don Carlos, please," said the governor-general.

  "Maybe they will," replied Falconer, fixing Chagres with a bold and piercing stare. "That won't bother them. To go down fighting is the way those men want to go."

  "Perhaps if you talked to them," suggested Don Luis. "Tried to reason with them."

  Falconer felt sorry for the governor-general. The man was trying to be reasonable and trying to prevent more bloodshed. But he was caught between the rock of an intractable Don Carlos and the hard place of a bunch of mountain men who would not bow to any authority they did not choose to recognize—and who most assuredly would not go like lambs to the slaughter.

  "I can't," he said, with genuine regret, because everything he had done since arriving in California had been to keep the peace, and now it appeared to have all been for naught. "In this case, they wouldn't listen to me."

  " But you are their leader."

  Falconer nodded. "But they still wouldn't listen, believe me."

  Flustered, Don Lu
is glanced at Ramirez. The young lieutenant was carefully impassive. He knew his place and would do his duty. His place was not to make suggestions or make his personal feelings known, and his duty was to do the bidding of the governor-general, without question, without hesitation, and whether he agreed with it or not.

  The governor-general walked to the window, hands clasped tightly behind his back, shoulders bowed with the weight of his troubles, his brows knit in a worried frown.

  "Don't do it," said Falconer. "You have me. I won't make any trouble for you. Let my men go. I can promise you they will leave California immediately."

  "You and your men should never have come here," snapped Chagres. "We opened our homes to you, gave you our friendship and our trust. And this is how we have been repaid. A woman murdered. My daughter abducted."

  "Your daughter was not kidnapped," said Falconer, slowly but surely losing his grip on his temper. "She left you of her own free will because you were . . ."

  With a snarl like a wild animal's, Don Carlos launched himself at Falconer. Falconer's Hawken lay on the table. A pistol and knife were stuck in his belt. But he did not reach for a weapon. He was ready, willing, and able to take Chagres apart with his bare hands.

  But Lieutenant Ramirez intervened. He knew better than to lay a hand on Don Carlos; he merely placed his body in Chagres's path. Don Carlos drew up short. There was something about Ramirez—perhaps it was his stance or his stoic expression—that made it clear to Don Carlos, and everyone else in the room, that it would be far simpler to get through a mountain of solid rock than the young lieutenant.

  "Don Carlos," said the governor-general severely, "you are only making matters worse. I must ask you to leave."

  Chagres stared at Don Luis as though he could not believe his ears. But this time the governor-general was not making a request. He was telling Chagres what to do, and in no uncertain terms. He had drawn a line, finally, and now it was up to Chagres to decide whether he dared cross it.