Hawk 13, page 7
Hawk reined in, studying the terrain ahead. It was later than he had thought, the sun already close to the rimrock, shadow starting to spill over the lower reaches. He came to a fast decision and turned the horse into a stand of dark timber, over and down from the vee-shaped canyon. He dismounted and hitched the pony to a low-slung branch, then slid the Winchester clear of the scabbard and moved forward on foot.
His head was still aching and each step sent a rush of pain through his body. He felt angry and determined: ready to kill. He began to climb the ridge south of the bottom spur, working his way up through the trees to emerge on the crest of the spur.
The crest was thick with pine and maple, the overlay of branches combining with the dying light to hide his passage. He reached the northern edge of the spur and went down on his belly, peering into the miniature canyon below. The sun was down behind the ridge by now, only a little light reflecting from the sky so that the air had a darkening blue haziness. In the canyon, the darkness was lit by the glow of a fire. In the glow Hawk could see the bulk of the wagon, the team hitched close by. There were only two other horses as best he could tell. And two men by the fire. One stretched out flat under a blanket, the other sitting close beside him.
Hawk watched, waiting for the others to show. He waited until the sun was all the way down and the last of the light faded from the sky and still they hadn’t shown. He decided to go in.
He moved over the rim of the spur, working his way down from tree to tree until he was level with the two men by the fire. The one in the blanket still hadn’t moved and Hawk suddenly realized he must be wounded. He grinned to himself: Walker or Lee must have managed to hit at least one of the Bensons before they went down.
He lifted the Winchester to his shoulder, cocking the hammer.
Sparks erupted from the fire as his bullet hit and the seated man came up on his feet with a Colt in his hand. The man under the blanket still didn’t move.
‘Drop the gun!’ He moved sideways through the trees as he shouted, changing his position to confuse any return fire. ‘Else I kill you!’
The man with the Colt peered round, trying to pinpoint the voice.
Hawk sent a second shot into the ground six inches from his feet.
The Colt dropped.
‘For Chrissakes!’ The voice sounded young and frightened. ‘I got a wounded man here. He’s gut shot.’
‘So’re you, you try anything.’ Hawk’s voice was ugly with barely suppressed rage. ‘Where are the others?’
‘Cojeta!’ The man’s eyes were wide in the fire glow; frightened. ‘They went to fetch a doctor.’
Hawk came out from the trees with the Winchester pointed on the youngster’s belly. Up close he didn’t look much over twenty, probably younger because fear was adding lines to his face. He was hatless, blond hair straggling over the collar of an old work shirt tucked into faded Levis. His boots were scuffed and muddy. His gun belt sat awkwardly on his hips, as untended as his clothes. He didn’t look like a gunfighter. Didn’t even look much like a robber.
‘Which one are you?’
The boy was staring at Hawk like he was seeing a ghost. His eyes were huge now and his mouth was hanging open, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. He had to swallow before he could answer.
‘Tommy. Tommy Benson. You’re dead.’
‘I ain’t layin’ down,’ Hawk grunted. ‘Him?’
‘Vance.’ Tommy looked at his brother. ‘He’s got a slug in his belly.’
‘Tough.’ Hawk kicked the fallen Colt across the grass into the shadows. ‘How many more?’
‘Pa. He’s called Rafe.’ Tommy spoke fast, as though words could form a barrier between his body and the murder he saw in Hawk’s eyes. ‘An’ Keefer. That’s all.’
‘How far’s Cojeta?’ Hawk demanded.
‘They said they’d be back in three days.’ Tommy was almost stuttering now, his body rigid with fear. ‘They’re bringin’ a doctor.’
Hawk nodded, lowering the Winchester to flip the blanket covering Vance aside. He looked bad. His arms were folded tight across his belly and the material of his shirt was stiff with dried blood. His knees were drawn up to his chest, his head hunched down between his shoulders. He was shivering, spittle dry on his colorless lips.
‘He won’t last.’ Hawk turned from Vance to Tommy. ‘The money?’
‘On the wagon.’ Tommy tried to smile, but it looked more like a grimace of pain. ‘We ain’t touched it. Never got time.’
Hawk stared at him, face cold and deadly in the red glow of the fire. All his instincts told him to squeeze the trigger. To blast the kid the same way he had helped kill Walker and Lee and Clayton. Thought he’d helped kill Hawk. Tommy whimpered as he saw the thought in the gunfighter’s eyes, and a dark stain spread suddenly across the front of his pants. Hawk watched his fear, not enjoying it, but letting it plant a new thought in his mind.
Had it been only Tommy and Vance who had jumped the wagon, he would not have hesitated. They had tried to kill him—the fact that he was still alive was pure accident. Or good fortune, depending on the viewpoint. They had ambushed him and left him for dead. And in Hawk’s scale of reckoning that gave him the right to claim justice in his own way. But there were two more of them. And if Tommy was telling the truth, they would come back here in three days and find two dead men. That could put them on Hawk’s trail with vengeance spurring them on. And they’d be riding saddle horses while he was teaming a wagon into Tucson. There would be a settling eventually, of that he felt certain. But not yet. Not while his first commitment was still to Sweeney: to get the money through. Not while the wagon would slow him and leave him open to attack. When it came, he wanted it on his own terms.
His face stayed cold as the thought coalesced. Vance might just last long enough they’d come back to find him still alive. That would slow them: either they’d take him back home, or to Cojeta, or wherever; or they’d split up; or they’d take time out to bury him. If both brothers were dead, there’d be nothing to slow the others. But if Tommy was left alive to tend Vance … left without a horse …
‘Get the team hitched.’ Hawk gestured with the Winchester.
‘You ain’t gonna kill me?’ Tommy gaped in a mingling of disbelief and hope.
Hawk shook his head. ‘Not this time.’
The youngster moved fast to the tethered horses. Hawk watched as he settled them into the traces, then told him to hitch the two saddle ponies. He tossed both gun belts onto the wagon and emptied Tommy’s pistol, hurling the weapon far out into the trees. Then he climbed onto the drive seat and turned the horses towards the neck of the canyon.
‘You take real good care of your brother.’
Tommy nodded dumbly, staring in puzzlement at the gunfighter. As soon as Hawk was gone from sight he ran to Vance, tugging the blanket back over the wounded man. His hands were shaking.
Hawk steered down and round to where he had left his own mount, hitching it with the others behind the wagon. Then he moved on through the trees, grateful for the moon that had come up to light the valley. He headed south, planning to pick up the stage trail and use the direct route to make time. To stay ahead of the Bensons. He loosed the two horses where the valley broadened out into the pass, then continued into the growing glow of the dawn. His head was pounding again, and lack of sleep reddened his eyes, but he kept the horses moving steadily eastwards in the direction of Tucson.
The doctor in Cojeta was a man called Hyams. Benjamin Hyams. He was also the barber and the undertaker. What medical knowledge he had came from a fascination with textbooks and a natural skill with sick animals. The way he figured it, there wasn’t much difference when it came to tending men—they just suffered his ministrations with more complaining than a dumb beast.
He didn’t enjoy getting woken up in the middle of the night by two unshaven gun-toting desperadoes who gave him a choice of getting shot or naming his own price for fixing their gut-shot son—or brother: he wasn’t sure which. He was, however, sure of their promise to kill him if he refused. Less so about the promised money.
And when he saw Vance Benson, he got very worried.
‘He ain’t gonna last. Jesus Christ! It’s a goddam miracle he’s lived this long.’
He pointed to the puckered hole in Vance’s belly. Old blood was crusted around the lips of the wound, overlaid by an oozing of pus. The skin was blackened with the beginnings of gangrene, a putrescent odor wafting from the hole. Vance’s face was unnaturally pale, his lips drawn back thin and blanched from gritted teeth. His breath came in short gasps, each movement of his lungs sending a fresh tremor of pain through his body. He was bathed in sweat, fever wracking his wasted body.
‘Do what you can,’ ordered Rafe Benson. Then turned to Tommy: ‘What the hell happened?’
‘He came back.’ Tommy shook his head, still not quite believing it. ‘He came back an’ took the wagon.’
‘Who for Chrissakes?’ snarled Keefer. ‘We killed them all.’
Hyams looked up from Vance’s stomach, his face worried. Keefer ignored him.
‘Make sense, kid.’ His voice was a hoarse, angry rasp. ‘Who come back?’
‘The gunfighter. Hawk.’ Tommy stared at his elder brother, too weary with tending Vance to feel afraid now of Keefer’s fury. ‘He had a Winchester.’
‘An’ you let him get it?’ Keefer choked on his rage. ‘You just let him take it?’
‘He had the drop on me.’ Tommy glanced to his father for support. Rafe was staring at Vance, teeth working on his lower lip. ‘Wasn’t nothin’ I could do, Keefer.’
‘Jesus!’ Keefer thrust his balled fists into the pockets of his duster. ‘Christ Jesus! We do all that an’ you let him take it away from us. A goddam dead man.’
‘He was alive,’ said Tommy; dull. ‘He come back.’
‘All right.’ Keefer glared at his younger brother. ‘So we go after him again. Make sure of it this time.’
‘No!’ Rafe Benson’s voice cut like a whiplash across his eldest son’s fury. ‘We leave him.’
‘What?’ Keefer stared at his father, mouth opening in surprise. ‘After all this?’
Benson nodded.
‘We wait until the doc here’s done what he can for Vance. Then we go back home. Hawk’ll be long gone, an’ we ain’t but two horses now.’
‘Three.’ Keefer nodded in the direction of Hyams’s pony.
Benson looked at him, wondering what he had made his sons. Remembering the way his wife had pleaded with him not to try taking the wagon. Not relishing the thought of facing her again.
‘The doc’ll need his pony,’ he said. ‘To get back home.’
‘Dead men don’t ride,’ snarled Keefer. ‘With three horses, we stand a chance.’
‘There’s been enough killing.’ Benson’s shoulders were slumped, his face gray under the beard growth. ‘I don’t want no more.’
‘The hell you don’t!’ Keefer faced his father with his features set in ugly lines. ‘I come too far to stop now. You ain’t standin’ in my way, Pa.’
‘You gonna kill me, boy?’ Benson sounded like he wouldn’t care too much.
‘If you try to stop me.’ Keefer turned to his horse. ‘I’m goin’ after him. Tommy?’
Tommy shook his head.
‘All right, so I go alone.’ Keefer swung into the saddle. ‘I’ll send word.’
‘Yeah.’ Benson watched him canter away through the trees. ‘You do that.’
It took Vance Benson the rest of the day and half the night to die. There was nothing Benjamin Hyams could do for him: the .44-40 slug from Clayton Lee’s Winchester had torn up too much of his insides to leave him any chance of survival. He was bleeding internally and gangrenous just to complicate his death. It was not pretty.
Hyams watched as Rafe and Tommy scooped out a shallow grave and covered the body as best they could. When they were done he mounted his horse, wondering if they would try to stop him.
They didn’t, so he ventured to ask if they could pay him.
Benson laughed then, a thin, rattling sound that was tinged with hysteria.
‘We had it,’ he said. ‘We had it all. But then we lost it.’
‘Easy come,’ murmured Hyams, ‘easy go.’
‘Mister,’ grunted Rafe. ‘It didn’t come easy. Not easy at all.’
Chapter Nine
TUCSON SHOWED LIKE a promise against the heat-hazed emptiness of the prairie. The buildings huddled squat and dark and cool-looking on the sunbaked ground, holding the lure of cold beer and soft beds like a dangled temptation on the edges of Hawk’s vision. He wiped his gloved left hand across his mouth, feeling the leather scrape on dry skin, and lifted his canteen. It was the last of his water; it tasted brackish and warm. He swilled it around his mouth and spat it out, flicking the reins to drive the weary horses to a final effort.
Beard growth stubbled his cheeks and his eyes were sunken, heavy shadows beneath. He had slept little since leaving the valley, pushing on as fast as the horses could manage in an effort to stay ahead of pursuit. The wound on his temple throbbed with a dull, penetrating ache, the bandanna crusted stiff and hard on his hair where blood had seeped. His eyes felt gritty from watching for signs of attack by the Bensons or Apaches or road agents, and his stomach felt hollow for want of fresh, hot food.
He steered along Main Street, habit turning his gaze from side to side, right hand close to the Colt holstered on his hip. The town was bigger and busier than Santa Rosa, people halting on the sidewalks to watch him go by, riders turning their ponies aside to grant him passage. He saw the bank—a single-story building with white adobe covering its stone blocks and bars decorating the windows—and halted in front. He climbed down, grunting as the drop to the ground sparked freshets of pain inside his skull, and went inside. It was cool there, the windows shuttered against the heat, the tiled floor ringing under his boots, and he paused, enjoying the relief. A long counter faced him, shiny brass rails reaching to the low ceiling, men in shirtsleeves behind, counting money. There was a guard inside the door, perched on a stool with a shotgun cradled in his brawny arms. He looked at the gunfighter doubtfully.
Hawk turned to him.
‘I got some money to deposit. Who do I see?’
The guard looked like he didn’t believe a man looking like Hawk would enter a bank to deposit anything. Try to take something out, maybe; but not make a deposit. His thumb touched the hammer of the shotgun as he ducked his head in the direction of the counter.
‘Tellers right in front of you, feller.’
‘Twenty thousand dollars,’ Hawk rasped.
The guard’s mouth dropped open and his eyes narrowed in ratio to the frown lines that appeared on his forehead, ‘Say that again.’
‘You deaf?’ Irritation lent a further edge to the weariness in Hawk’s voice. The guard looked at him, debating whether this was a joke or some kind of elaborate hold-up. He shifted his weight on the stool so that the scattergun came round to point at the gunfighter’s belly, then slid clear. He was a head shorter than Hawk and looked too heavy in the gut to manage a fast draw. The shotgun made up the difference. He jerked his head again, this time in the direction of an oak-paneled door off to one side of the room.
‘Office over there. Walk in front o’ me.’
Hawk moved towards the door. The guard came alongside, angling the shotgun across his belly as he tapped on the polished wood. A voice called for him to enter and he swung the door open, still pointing the gun at Hawk.
‘Feller here says he’s got twenty thousand dollars to deposit, Mr. Hayes.’
‘Sweeney’s money.’ Hawk spoke over the guard’s head.
‘Come in.’ The white-haired man behind the big mahogany desk stood up. ‘I’ve been expecting you.’
The guard nodded self-importantly. ‘All right, feller. Go on in.’
Hawk looked at him, eyes cold. ‘Next time you see me, you best remember something.’
‘Yeah?’ The man frowned some more, waiting.
‘Yeah,’ said Hawk. ‘Point that scattergun someplace else. Or I’ll shove it where it hurts an’ pull both triggers. Then we’ll both have piles to deposit.’
The guard went pale, then flushed. He started to mutter something, but the white-haired man said, ‘That’ll be all, Henry.’ The guard bit off his retort and slammed the door. The white-haired man came round the desk.
‘Jonathan Hayes.’ He extended a hand. ‘You are?’
‘Jared Hawk,’ said the gunfighter. ‘Sweeney hired me to bring the money through.’
Hayes nodded, motioning to a chair. ‘You had trouble?’
‘Some.’ Hawk sat down. ‘But I made it. The money’s outside.’
‘I thought Mr. Black would deliver it,’ said Hayes.
Hawk grinned as he realized the banker was referring to Ace. Sweeney must have a sense of humor to have given his slaves a name like that. He shook his head.
‘Ace is in Santa Rosa looking after his boss.’
‘Ah.’ Hayes nodded. ‘So you were sent. Not alone, though?’
‘The others got killed,’ said Hawk. ‘I told you we had trouble.’
Hayes looked at him, not sure what to say. There was an air of contained anger about the man seated in his neat office, a menace that threatened to explode from under the surface calm. He hid his unease with a gesture to the door.
‘I’ll have it unloaded.’
He opened the door and called orders, then returned to seat himself across from Hawk as though the desk would offer protection.
‘A drink?’
‘Water.’
Hawk watched as the banker produced a decanter of clear water. He drank several glasses, feeling the coolness settle the dust in his throat, then took the whiskey Hayes offered. It ran down inside him like cool fire, spreading out along his nerve ends so that he began to relax slightly. The door opened again and shirt-sleeved tellers began stacking wooden boxes on the floor in front of a big safe.
