The Wicked and the Dead, page 9
“Are you following the Mexican Trail?”
“We are. We have many horses and guns and lots to trade.” Kills Them All waved at the girl. “And two slaves that will bear us more children. It has been a good war trail.”
“You have much spirit. I haven’t seen that in a while.”
“It is because Kwana and Isatai have good medicine that makes us all stronger. He is Kwahadi.”
“Ah, Antelope band.”
“Yes. We have ridden with him this past season, and his men number over five hundred. What band is yours?”
“Waaia.” Two-Horses chose that small splinter group because that one small band had camped for a time near his family in the Northeastern Territories. He had no intention of telling them everything about his life, though he’d be free of them quickly enough.
“You are still our brother.”
Instead of agreeing, Two-Horses raised a questioning eyebrow. “Why are you down here alone?”
“The White men sent soldiers after us, and we split up for a while.” Kills Them All waved a hand left and right. “They don’t know how to catch us when we scatter. It is a good joke on them.”
The one whom Two-Horses thought of as Long Scar laughed and pointed a finger at the girl. The obvious threat made her cringe, and she looked around as if seeking escape. Such an idea was foolish, because she would either die alone in the desert or the cruel warrior would catch and kill her.
“Girl!” Kills Them All waved at her and again spoke in Spanish, the language they’d long ago learned to communicate with prisoners and those they traded with. The Comanche were great traders when they wanted something. “Get this man a shirt from that bundle.”
Long Scar frowned. “You should not give her orders. She is my prisoner.”
“I’ve decided she’s mine. You do not treat her well, and she is getting slower from your beatings. I might let you have her back when we get home. We won’t have to move as fast, then.”
The girl crawled over to a nearby pack and untied the leather bindings. She pulled out a shirt obviously stolen from some unfortunate farmer or traveler and brought it to Two-Horses. The bright blue Mexican shirt was light, and he pulled it over his head. There were no buttons, and it had only a light bloodstain on the long tail.
It was the first piece of fine cloth that Two-Horses had worn in years. He smoothed the material across his chest. “Thank you for this.”
Long Scar rose to go after the girl, who’d already turned away, but Two-Horses held out a hand. “Kills Them All is right. She’s no good to you if she’s stove up.”
“This is none of your business, stranger.”
“Just making conversation.”
Long Scar looked at him in suspicion. “You sound like a White man.”
Knowing he’d given himself away, Two-Horses made a face. “As I said, I have been living in a prison. There are White men in there, also. I talked with them every day.”
“Why would they put one of us in prison?” Another warrior frowned. “Men kill us when they can, and true Comanches won’t be taken prisoner. I’ve never heard of our people in prison.”
They were getting into dangerous ground. If the band found out he’d taken up the White man’s path and ridden with them, they’d kill him on the spot, even though he was a guest in their camp.
“I was chased across the river and a guardia captured me.” He pointed to an old scar on his forehead. “When you’re knocked unconscious and wake up in chains, you have no choice but to submit and wait for a chance to escape, which I did, as you can see.”
Nods all around told him most of the warriors believed his story.
Long Scar spat. “I don’t believe everything you say.”
“It is your right.” Two-Horses paused, thinking. “And as a guest in your camp, I have other rights.”
Kills Them All nodded. “It is true. What do you want?”
“A gun and knife, and the horse you promised. And the girl.” Two-Horses didn’t like the way she was treated. He valued women more than the warriors around him. It was a curse placed upon him from living with White men, and Hack Long, especially.
Long Scar stiffened. “You can’t have her!”
Kills Them All chopped at the air with the edge of his hand. “Enough! Two-Horses can ask and receive anything he wants. He came to us in the old way, and I think he has an ancient spirit that would be appeased.”
He handed Two-Horses the knife he’d been using to cut the roasting meat, then pointed at one of the younger warriors squatting nearby. “Get him a rifle and pistol, and ammunition.”
Long Scar spat again and stalked off. The young warrior left to rummage through another pack and came back with a Colt and a lever-action rifle that had seen better days. Kills Them All took the weapons from the young man and handed them to Two-Horses.
Two-Horses relaxed and took the weapons. “Thank you again, my friend, for these gifts.”
“I hope you prove worthy of them. There is a hacienda a day’s ride from here. Coyote Ears snuck up on it and saw two Mexicans there with fine horses. We will kill the men and take their horses and guns. You being here is a sign that we will have great success, Two-Horses.”
Two-Horses shrugged. He broke open the pistol and checked the loads. As the others watched, he shook them out, closed the revolver, and dry-snapped it.
“You can never trust a new gun.”
The statement was funny and true. The men nodded and spoke soft words of affirmation. It had been so long since he’d heard so much Comanche that Two-Horses didn’t understand half of what they said. Reloading and laying the pistol across his leg, he repeated the procedure with the rifle, shucking out the shells and snapping it as well.
“Bien.” The Spanish word came unbidden, another result of being in the Mexican prison for so long. Satisfied that it worked, he reloaded the rifle and laid it beside him. Taking up the pistol once again, he thumb-cocked it and shot Kills Them All in the chest.
Shocked at what just happened, the others froze in disbelief. He cocked the pistol a second time and shot the nearest man beside him in the same fashion. The next four bullets killed the others who struggled to rise and react.
Dropping the empty pistol, Two-Horses picked up the rifle at the same time a bullet plucked at his new shirt. It was Long Scar with a stolen Henry .44 caliber. Like the others, he was shocked at the sudden carnage and fired too fast. Seeing Two-Horses come to one knee with the rifle, Long Scar spun and ran toward the horses.
Two-Horses shouldered the repeater, aimed at the middle of the fleeing man’s back, and fired. The bullet caught Long Scar between the shoulders, and he fell face-first, hard. In the distance, Two-Horses saw the boy who was watching the horses leap on a roan’s back and kick him in the ribs. He was gone in a flash.
One of the men beside the fire groaned, and Two-Horses jacked the lever to load another round and shot him again. The camp was quiet, the silence broken only by a distant bird and horses, snorting and grazing as if nothing had happened.
He looked down at the body of Kills Them All. “I left your kind of life for a reason.”
Wide-eyed, the girl stood nearby, as still as a post, waiting to see what would happen. Two-Horses reloaded the pistol and stuck it through the waist belt holding the loincloth under his shirt.
She spoke Spanish. “Please do not hurt me.”
“Do you speak English?”
She nodded, hands at her sides. “Yes.”
“Good. I’m tired of talking Spanish. And I don’t intend to hurt you.”
“You killed your people.”
“I sure did. It was their misfortune to trust me. I left their kind of life a long time ago because there was no future in it. Go get us a couple of those ponies over there while I load some of this stuff up and skin one of these guys out of his leggings. I don’t intend to go bare legged any longer.” He looked around. “Kills Them All said there was another slave.”
The girl pointed. “She is over there. She killed herself in the night by chewing through an artery in her arm. I am surprised they haven’t noticed, probably because you came up.”
“She was determined, then. We need to go.”
“Where?”
“Texas.”
“But my home is Monclova.”
“Which way is that?”
She pulled a strand of hair from her eyes and pointed to the southeast.
“Well, we’re going the other direction.”
“To where?”
“A little town called Barlow. You can stay here or make your way back home, but I’m going to Texas.”
She looked south, then north. “I will go with you.”
CHAPTER 17
Billy Lightning and Captain Hawkins came over a ridge to find the Rio Grande down below, flowing wide and red on its way to the gulf. The Ranger stood in his stirrups as if the extra few inches would give him a better line of sight. “Well, I’ll be hog-tied.”
“What do you see?”
“The river.”
“Well, that’s where we were headed.” Billy wanted to kick his mount in the flanks and race down to Texas.
Instead, the Ranger remained where he was. “That’s a fact, but it’s not supposed to be here.” He flicked a finger. “Chamizal is supposed to be down there, about two miles away.”
Billy looked around them, where the scrubby chamizal plant grew in an inordinate amount. “It’s all around us.”
“I’m talking about the town. See that smoke over there?”
A faint drift of black smoke rose in the air some distance away. “I do.”
“Something’s burning down out there. A house or part of the town, I suppose, from the black smoke.” He paused, thinking. “Might be a Comanche raid burning out a rancho or maybe the whole town, though there’s not enough smoke to indicate such a thing.”
“I still don’t understand.”
“The river left its banks up yonder and moved south from all that rain a couple of weeks ago. I bet it left Chamizal high and dry. It’ll likely die.” The captain thought for a second. “I bet they’re burning the town for that reason.”
“I’ve heard about some rivers moving, but not the Rio Grande.”
“Unusual, for sure, but rivers are snakes, and they’re inclined to writhe under the assault of great volumes of water.”
The Ranger studied the muddy river for several minutes as Billy checked over his shoulder. He didn’t care to find a company of Mexican guardias or bandits coming upon them so close to his escape. “That’s still Texas over there, ain’t it?”
“There might be some dispute over that claim, but, yeah, when we get to the town, it’ll be Texas, if they say it is. Countries, or even states, have gone to war over a mile or two of land reassigned by a river that’s up and moved on its own.”
“Can we cross here?”
“I believe so, now that the water’s gone down. It is hardpack underfoot, and such will remain under the surface of the river. It hasn’t had time to cut a bed, so it should be fairly level. The horses will have to tread lightly, but be prepared to slide off and hold your mount’s tail if he goes to swimming. You’ve crossed deep water before, haven’t you?”
“I have, but like you said, maybe it hasn’t cut much of a channel yet.”
“That is my hope, but if the current was powerful long enough, it’ll scour out the softer, loose sand and fine gravel. If it’s dug out, the bottom might fall out from under us.” The Ranger kneed his horse forward, and they found a game trail leading down past a highwater mark ten feet above where they rode. The horses picked their way carefully. When they reached the river’s edge, Hawkins pondered the fast-moving water for a moment. “There’s no way to know how deep it is, so take care. Let’s go, Silky.”
The horse sniffed at the surface for a moment, snorted, and took a ginger step forward. “Since the current is so fast, I believe it’s fairly shallow here.” As the Ranger expected, the ground underfoot hadn’t had enough time to silt up and get boggy, so Silky gained confidence and waded across. The water only reached the captain’s stirrups, and he was soon on the Texas side, with Billy right behind.
Excited that he was back home, the young man whooped. “Safe at last!”
The Ranger stopped when a faint shout and three gunshots echoed over the river bottoms. “Relatively speaking.” He kicked his horse into a lope, and Billy followed.
* * *
They soon came upon a wagon stuck hub deep in the mud of what was the old riverbed. Half a mile behind a man and a woman who were struggling with the mired vehicle, what was left of a town burned hot and fast. The water had been high at some point and had pushed a number of structures off their foundations. Smoke and ash rose into the air.
The Ranger shook his head. “There are five elements in this world. Wood, fire, earth, wind, and water. It looks like most of them have gotten together and taken this settlement, all except for those two poor souls standing there.”
The man and the woman were muddy up to their waists, and it appeared that they’d been trying to free the rig for some time. In addition, a team of mules were bogged belly deep in their traces, with the wagon they were attached to buried all the way to the bottom of the bed. Their heads hung low in exhaustion.
The Ranger reined up at the edge of what was once the river, but now it was a sea of mud. “Looks like you folks tried crossing at the wrong place. I believe I would have found a better place. Dad blame me. I used the same noun in two places. I prefer not to do that and instead utilize a better sentence structure. Please forgive me.”
The man, up to his knees in the muck, tilted his hat back. “We was told this was the crossing.” He pointed at three tall cottonwoods that reached fifty feet into the air. “Said right here beside these trees.”
“Was the crossing.” The Ranger hooked one leg over the saddle horn and fished in his shirt pocket for a match and the makings. “It’s a mud hole now where the river once flowed, and that presents a problem for all four of us.”
“I don’t see a problem. I see a solution.”
“Pray tell, what is that?” Hawkins sprinkled tobacco on a paper and rolled it with expertise.
The traveler nodded as if Hawkins had confirmed a decision. “Your horses can help pull out my team.”
“That won’t be likely.”
“How come?”
“Because you got yourselves into that mess, and I don’t intend to muddy up my clothes and tire these horses to pull a simpleton like you from such a mudhole.” Hawkins licked the paper and rolled the cigarette into proper form. “I have a mission to complete and intend to do it with all haste.”
“Blast you, man! We need help with this wagon!”
“Sir, I don’t appreciate being cursed, and I am a Texas Ranger. I enforce laws and protect the public. If you were beset by outlaws or Comanches, I’d be at your service, but that’s where it starts and ends.”
The man shifted his attention to Billy. “How about you, then?”
“It’s his horse and I’m riding with him.” Billy shrugged. “I don’t have a say in this matter.”
The man’s face reddened. “The hell with you both. I’ll just take them from you.”
“I am damned, for sure, because I’ve shot many men who needed killing, but you aren’t taking anything.” The Ranger thumbed a match to light and lifted the tiny flame up to his smoke.
He was intent on the small task as the enraged man snatched a repeater from the wagon. “I’ll take your life, then!” The rifle rose, and whether it was luck or skill, the first shot caught the Ranger in the throat, and he threw his arms wide and fell.
His well-trained horse shied from the detonation, then stopped only a few feet away from where the body hit the ground.
Not wanting to take on a .44 in the hands of such a good shot, Billy wheeled his borrowed horse around and kicked it in the flanks, but the man was obviously proficient with the Henry. A bullet slapped the saddle skirt just forward of Billy’s knee, and the animal stumbled and went down on its side.
Billy had just enough time to kick himself free, and he landed hard behind the horse’s body when a third shot thumped into its belly. It groaned, kicked twice, and lay still. Another round buzzed past Billy’s head. Relying on the speed of youth, he leaped to his feet and sprinted back the way he’d come, heading for the Ranger’s mount, which stood there as unconcerned as if it were merely thundering.
He registered the woman’s shrill voice screaming at her husband to stop shooting as another bullet whizzed past. Shooting a man on the run is more difficult than one sitting still or such a large target as a fifteen-hundred-pound animal. Rattled at the miss, the man shot again and jacked another round into the chamber as Billy reached the horse’s offside and snatched the Ranger’s Henry from the scabbard.
Adding to the melee, the stuck mules jumped and brayed in their harness, only miring themselves deeper in the soft, soupy mud of the former river channel.
The Ranger’s horse screamed just as the report of still another shot reached Billy’s ears. It staggered sideways and, hit still again, dropped where it stood. With his heart pounding in his ears, Billy fell with the dying animal to present as small a target as possible and braced the rifle across its twitching body.
The gunman hadn’t moved from where he stood in the knee-deep mud. He was jacking another round into the chamber when Billy shouldered the rifle, lined up on the man’s chest, and fired. Still buried to his knees and hit straight in the heart, the man fell backward in the mud with a wet slap and was still.
The woman, only a few feet behind him, held up her hands. “Don’t shoot! Please don’t shoot me! I don’t have a weapon.”
“I can see that.” Now that it was over, Billy stood and glanced around as if expecting spectators. “Stay where you are.”
“I can’t move more than a step at a time in this muck.”
He knelt to feel the Ranger’s chest, which no longer drew air. “Your husband killed a lawman here.”
