Dead River, page 5
His finger touched the set trigger and heard the click. He waited, both eyes open, one watching the road, the other staring at the crosshairs on the sight.
Now, he thought, still holding his breath, and before the target appeared in the sights, he touched the second trigger. The stock slammed against his shoulder, the roar of the cannon he held rocked his ears, and his nose and mouth breathed in the acrid smell of gunpowder. Already running, he found the road and raced up the hill, fumbling to eject the brass casing and replace it with a fresh load.
The strawberry roan was down, struggling but unable to rise. Breen refused to feel anything. Even Matt McCulloch, who loved horses more than he loved people, would understand. A man did whatever it took to survive. A man did whatever he needed to when it came to avenging the murder of an innocent young mother and her husband. A man did whatever he had to when it came to making a butcher like the Apache pay for leaving a little, bitty baby to bake and die underneath the brutal West Texas sun and wind.
He shifted the Sharps to his left hand and drew the .38 with his right.
Reaching the hill, he saw the signs. The Indian had been thrown forward when the horse somersaulted. He had dragged himself into the brush. Breen’s instincts took over and he dropped beside the strawberry roan just an instant before a pistol shot whistled past his ear.
The Apache was on the downslope. He hadn’t been able to see Breen until he reached the top where the dying horse snorted and bled. Three legs were broken, and the lead bullet had torn through the roan’s lungs.
A kind man, Breen figured, would put a bullet from the Colt into the animal’s brain, end its suffering, but he wasn’t a kind man. And with an Apache lying in the brush with a revolver of some kind, Breen knew he might have need of every bullet he had.
The wind blew hard down the hill, bringing dust and the smell of dry air with it. That gave Breen an idea. Easing the Colt and the Sharps onto the ground near the horse’s belly, he crawled around the dying animal and through the manure and urine the roan could not control. He moved as close as he could to the brush then fingered the poster he had taken off the post office wall in El Paso. Wanted for murdering a dance-hall girl in Arnold’s Town, R.G. Cordell might have to wait a while.
Ignoring the loss of the $250 bounty, Breen fished a match out of his vest pocket, struck it against his thumb, and held the flame at a corner of the wanted poster out of the wind, watching it catch easily. Then he stretched out his arm and dropped the burning poster on dead grass and dead brush.
Texas is a funny place, he thought as the flame grew. Down where the homesteaders had claimed their acres, a body could hardly find anything other than cactus that would grow. But on the ridgetop and the other side of the hill, grass and brush grew then died from the lack of water. I wonder why those folks decided to claim land on that side of the hill, instead of the other. Not that it matters now.
The Apache would have killed them no matter where they had decided to put down their roots, unless they had filed a claim on land in, say, Montana Territory. Even there, they would probably have been killed by Cheyennes or Sioux.
Fueled by the strong, hot wind, the flames found fuel, grew intensely hot and large. The crackling became louder, the smoke thicker, and Breen moved back, still using the horse’s trembling body for a redoubt, and found the Sharps and the Colt. He crawled through a river of blood to the horse’s head, heard a snort and what sounded like a human groan. With the wind and the roaring of flames to his left, he couldn’t be certain.
Then he knew.
Lifting his head, he saw the horse’s eye. The strawberry roan was dead.
“Damn.” He felt anger rush to his head. “Damn. Murdering Apache devil.”
That strawberry roan had been a real fine horse. It should have been. It was one of Matt McCulloch’s horses, and the Indian had forced Breen to shoot it down. Only six years old, it could carry a bounty hunter miles and miles, and should have lived to a ripe old age.
Breen pulled both weapons in front of his head, looked at the ground where the Apache had hit the dirt hard, and read enough signs to tell him the Indian had dragged himself into the bush. The flames were about twenty feet uphill of that spot.
Breen looked east, and saw the ditch formed by rainwater running downhill, away from the burning homestead below. “Greenhorns,” he said aloud, just so he could hear his voice, hear what he was thinking as the roaring furnace to the west became deafening. Another reason they should have claimed the land on the northeast side of the hill.
Holding the Sharps in his left hand and the Colt in his right, Breen moved away from the heat and rolled into the ditch. Moving faster going downhill, he measured himself as he crawled like a snake. Fifty feet later, he stopped and chanced a look. The wind was blowing to the northwest, carrying flames and smoke toward the high desert mountains, leaving Breen with a clear view. It moved faster than he had expected, but it would run out of fuel in four hundred yards and die out.
Fire could be wondrous, Breen marveled as he remembered watching a house of ill repute burn down in Gibson-burg toward the Río Grande. No man, especially a man who had been thrown from a galloping horse headfirst onto hard West Texas turf could outrun a fire. Especially not flames powered by a hot, dry summer and a brutal West Texas wind.
He saw the Apache standing about thirty yards downhill, off on the other side of the road, naturally. And just about where Breen expected to find him.
The man was brave and cunning. Breen had to give him that. And he was far from a fool. The dirty dog ran. Ran as hard as he could, despite the limp in his left leg and carrying a Winchester repeater in his right hand. He reached the road, clear of the flames.
By then Breen had dragged the Sharps to his shoulder. He eared back the hammer, tightened the stock against his shoulder, and touched the set trigger. Then the second trigger.
The cannon roared again. Breen let the Sharps fall into the ditch while he stood, palming the Lightning in his right hand. The bullet had splintered the stock of the Winchester, sending the rifle flying back toward the rushing flames, and dropping the buck to the ground.
He rose to his feet and reached for a sheathed knife, only to stop suddenly. Breen held his .38 by both hands, six feet away. His arms were not shaking.
“Drop it.” Breen repeated the phrase in Spanish. He didn’t speak Apache, and he doubted if this warrior savvied English, but most men in that part of the country could understand some Spanish.
The Apache froze, his black eyes stared harder at Breen. “Mátame,” the warrior said. “Ahora.”
Kill me. Now.
Breen shook his head. “Nada.” He motioned with his head. The Lightning did not move half an inch.
The warrior understood. His right hand found the deer-horn handle and easily drew the knife from the beaded sheath, but his black eyes never looked away from Breen. The knife flew into the dirt.
Far too experienced to look at anything but the Apache, Breen motioned with the Lightning’s barrel, and the Apache pushed himself to his feet.
Breen backed up far enough to pick up the Sharps and tilted his head up the slope. “You first,” he said in English. “Back to the homestead.” He started his best approximation of the order in Spanish but stopped when he saw the Indian’s left hand.
It was more than red, more than the copper-colored skin of an Apache. It was wretched, shriveled, and pinkish.
Jed Breen knew exactly who he had caught. “Blood Moon,” he whispered.
“Lucky norteamericano pig,” Blood Moon said, and then he smiled.
Breen steadied his breathing and his heart. “You speak English.”
The Apache’s face turned into stone.
“Move.” Again Breen waved the Colt. He stepped back, keeping a good, safe distance from the Apache butcher, and let the man pass.
Twenty yards past the dead roan, Breen made him stop . . . just long enough to grab the canteen and saddlebags off the horse.
“Andar,” Breen commanded, and he followed Blood Moon, the most notorious of all Apaches on both sides of the border, down the hill, still favoring one leg.
Flames burned down the far side of the rise. The fire was burning out at the homestead below.
Reaching the homestead, Breen made the Indian stop again. He pulled out the manacles from his saddlebags, tossed the irons toward Blood Moon, and watched him clamp on the cuffs. Breen ordered, “Lie down.”
The Apache obeyed. Breen put the leg manacles on the Indian himself, then checked the wrist bracelets, and searched the Indian for any other weapons. He found another knife and a pocket derringer. He took a sip of water from the canteen.
“Agua,” Blood Moon said.
Breen capped the canteen. “No. No water for you. You’d probably just pour it out.”
That brought a smile to the Apache’s face and warmth into his eyes.
Breen laid the canteen away, grabbed the length of chain connecting the ankle manacles, and dragged the Apache close to the dead mother’s body.
It was the only time Blood Moon showed fear.
“If you move an inch,” Breen whispered, “I’ll kill you.”
Blood Moon frowned.
“Stay here.”
As expected, Breen had found Blood Moon’s weakness. Apaches feared no man, no weapon, no god, but they were scared of the dead.
Breen spoke some gibberish, hoping the Indian might think he could speak to the dead, and then he hurried off to find the baby, no longer crying, but asleep. Alive, at least, Breen thought as he carried the little kid back to his prisoner and a corpse.
“All right. Move.”
Blood Moon rose and scurried away from the dead body. The baby still slept.
Breen pointed at the garden.
“There’s a hoe. Dig a grave.”
The warrior frowned.
“As deep as you can. In the garden. We’ve got a mule.”
“Good,” Blood Moon said. “I am hungry.”
Breen’s head shook. “The mule will carry the baby. And most likely me. You’ll walk. With luck, we’ll be in Purgatory City in three or four days.”
CHAPTER SIX
The last time Matt McCulloch went mustanging in these pretty mountains—well, pretty to him, who had only seen the Southern Rockies; and pretty, considering it was Texas—he had run into white scalphunters. The lowest form of humans, if you could call them human, were men killing Indians for scalps to peddle to the government in Mexico. He had also run into a Comanche boy.
So as the middle-aged horseman enjoyed his morning coffee, he made damned sure he kept the fire small and that the wood didn’t give off much smoke. Coffee only. No hot food, not even warming up jerky in a skillet.
Besides, breaking a horse like the snorting gray stallion in the pen McCulloch had built was not something anyone with a lick of sense wanted to do on a full stomach. He sipped his coffee with relish, letting it last but not get cold, while watching the magnificent piece of horseflesh trot around the fence, testing the cedar posts and rails, snorting, sniffing the ground, pawing up some dust, trying to find a weakness, a chance of escape. The tail remained arched, for this horse might lose its freedom, but never would lose its pride.
He brought the tin cup to his mouth and frowned. The cup was empty. Lowering the old piece of battered tin, Matt glanced at the blackened pot on a stone by the fire. He could use another drink. Another cup of coffee, another ten minutes of pleasure. That wouldn’t be a bad thing.
A sigh and a grunt followed as he rose off the boulder on which he sat. His left boot kicked sand over the flames and hot coals, and he put the cup on his makeshift chair of ancient lava rock.
His chaps flapped as he ambled toward the corral, unbuckling his gun rig, wrapping the belt over the holster, and laying that on a flat piece of granite on the eastern side of the pen. The stallion snorted, flashed angry eyes, and loped to the far side. Which was fine with McCulloch. The farther those unshod hooves were from stoving in his head, the better. Grabbing his rain slicker—though the sky remained a pristine blue with not a cloud within miles—off the flat rock, he slipped between the lower and middle rails and entered the corral.
The stallion gave an angry snort as the former Texas Ranger fished the deerskin gloves from the back pocket of his woolen britches and tugged them on slowly, keeping both eyes trained on the wild mustang. The gray’s head dipped, then came up, and the animal let out a snort, probably profanity in mustang language. Issuing his challenge. Daring the man to take one step closer. The horseman didn’t. Not yet. Breaking a horse was something a man did with patience.
McCulloch fetched the coiled lariat hanging over the top of one of the posts, and let the yellow slicker drape over the top rail.
He shook out a loop. It came as natural as drawing a Colt. He moved easily, whispering like he was coaxing a newborn to go to sleep. The stallion bolted, and McCulloch turned slowly, still moving toward the horse. When the gray went to another part of the corral, McCulloch never stopped his methodical stride.
The horse turned; McCulloch turned. The horse backed up; McCulloch went forward. The loop widened as the horseman began closing in, the hemp reata whistling through the air over his head. When the horse bolted, McCulloch let the lariat sail. A perfect throw landed the loop over the gray’s small head, then slid down the neck. The horse kept running, and McCulloch deftly braced the rope behind his back, holding tight with gloved hands on both ends of the rope.
The fun began. The rope burned through McCulloch’s corduroy vest, the winter shirt he wore despite the heat, the cotton underwear, and through maybe a layer of skin across the mustanger’s lower back. The gray reared, crying out a savage roar, and McCulloch ground his teeth, thinking if not saying every swear word he had ever heard. He was sweating like his body had opened up all the spigots, and he made his way back, the horse fighting him at every turn.
Breathing became a chore, almost impossible.
McCulloch felt the snubbing post next to him. He used every muscle he had and summoned up enough grim determination to put the lariat on the other side of the thick post. Quickly he made a single dally, wrapping more of the lariat against the snubbing post. The horse bolted. Smoke rose from the friction as the hemp tightened and pulled hard against the cedar.
His hands ached, burned by the rope despite the gloves, but McCulloch kept up his job. He ducked underneath the rope as the horse began circling. Throwing another dally around the post.
He felt lucky. Some horses would keep the fight up for hours, but the gray seemed to know fighting was fruitless. The horse stopped, turned to face McCulloch, and flared its nostrils, stamped its forefeet, and snorted twice. Then it backed up just enough to add tension to the rope that held him securely to the snubbing post. And urinated.
As if telling McCulloch exactly what the proud king with blood from Arabia thought of a puny white man in dust-covered clothes.
McCulloch tried to swallow and felt dust carve the back of his throat. His left leg ached something fierce—the reminder of a bad break he had taken about a year or so back.
Quitting—even for a moment to slake his thirst with water from a canteen—seemed inviting, but McCulloch wasn’t always patient. He limped back to fetch his rain slicker and slowly moved back to the horse. The gray snorted, twisted, grunted, and backed away as far as it could before the lariat tightened.
“Easy, boy,” McCulloch said.
“Easy . . . easy . . . easy . . . why . . . don’t you . . . go to . . . sleep.”
He was lucky. As he spoke, the horse focused on his face.
McCulloch flung the slicker perfectly over the gray’s eyes. The horse straightened, turned once to the left, and then froze. Blinded by the slicker, not knowing what to do, the horse became a statue. Its body, shining with sweat, trembled.
Pulling a small strip of calico from the mule-ear pockets on his pants, he used it to tie the slicker on.
“Easy, boy. Easy.” Slowly he backed away several feet before turning and moving with a purpose to find a canteen and the other items he would need for the real work.
He worked the saddle blanket only. Putting it on the horse’s back. Letting the horse smell it, feel it. Taking the blanket off. All of this McCulloch did with the slicker still serving as a blindfold on the mustang. Before the sun moved directly overhead, he was letting the horse get used to the saddle. Smell it. Feel it. Figure out the weight. He wouldn’t start cinching it until later.
After that, he removed the slicker and draped it over the snubbing post. He dragged a bucket of water to the stallion, let it drink, and found some grain, which he dropped beside the bucket. It was chow time for the horse while McCulloch dragged his aching body through the corral, found the tin cup and old pot, and had his noon meal of cold coffee and nothing else.
The afternoon passed as methodically as the morning. Blindfolding the stallion with the slicker. Blanket. Saddle. Blanket. Saddle. And then cinching the saddle, which took considerably longer. Before dusk, he climbed into the saddle and sat there. Even though the temperature cooled, his body flooded with sweat. He could feel the tension in the gray, but the horse did not buck. He dismounted, slowly, letting the horse get used to him then grabbed the horn, stepped into the stirrup, and swung into the saddle again. And again. And again. After removing the slicker, McCulloch rewarded the gray with a carrot, though he did it more to let the stallion smell his hand.
Don’t bite the hand that feeds you, he thought with a smile. And tomorrow, don’t buck the crazy fool off.
* * *
It didn’t work.
The next morning, after another breakfast of coffee and cold jerky, McCulloch repeated the process with the stallion blindfolded by the slicker. Then he took the slicker off, and, after the noon feeding and watering, he kept it off.
The saddle blanket he held under the gray’s nose, letting the horse catch the scent, and slowly put the blanket over the back. The horse turned to look, but since it was still secured by the lariat to the snubbing post, it did not buck or jump or kick out with its hind legs.
