Castroville: Countdown to Armageddon: Book 7 (9 page)

     After a couple of minutes, the first two mounted up and rode off toward the ranch house.

     “How long do we wait until we go?”

     Sara was getting a bit antsy.

     “I’m heading out now. You wait here until I get back.”

     “How come I knew you were going to say that?”

     “Because you’re a very intelligent young lady. And kinda cute too, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

     It was false flattery and she knew it, but she appreciated the effort.

     “You’re just trying to stay on my good side so I don’t give you a hard time about leaving me behind again.”

     He smiled, said “Yep,” and stole off into the night.

-16-

     Randy worked his way through the woods, walking parallel to the narrow roadway and the range fence that stood just on the other side of it. He went about two hundred yards until he determined he was not only far out of sight of the two sentries. He was also out of the range of sound for anything less than a yell or a gunshot.

     And he didn’t plan on generating any gunshots on this particular night.

     Hopefully any yells either.

     Before the sun set he’d noticed several regal oak trees, each one a hundred years old or more, growing at regular intervals about ten yards or so inside the property line. It wasn’t an uncommon practice in Texas in the early nineteen hundreds, when fencing materials were expensive and scarce. At one time the oaks probably identified the property line from a distance long before the fence was installed.

     Now they just beautified the ranch and gave it a certain air of dignity during the daytime.

     During the night, or at least on this particular night, they would be Randy’s allies.

     And his hiding place.

     He found the nearest oak and stood behind it. Its trunk was wider than his shoulders, the lowest branches three feet over his head.

     He’d have easily hidden behind it even in broad daylight.

     And it was dark outside.

     But he needed it to be even darker.

     Standing up and leaning against the back side of the tree he closed his eyes and tried to clear his thoughts. Clearing his head made it easier to focus his full attention on the sounds around him.

     Randy had a very sharp sense of hearing anyway. But on a calm night, eyes closed and focusing, he could quite literally hear the gentle breeze. Hear a dried leaf tumbling along the ground. Hear a cricket chirping from fifty yards away.

     And hear the boots of a man as that man walked through ankle high prairie grass.

     Randy waited as the footsteps grew louder and louder, then quieted by half as the tree trunk blocked much of the rustling. He was directly on the opposite side of the tree, passing the tall Ranger by.

     In Randy’s hand was a long billy club, made of oak many years before from a tree not unlike the one he leaned upon. It had belonged to his father, who’d been a beat cop in Houston before becoming a Ranger himself. He gave it to Randy on the day his son graduated from Texas Ranger school.

     “You probably won’t have much call to use this. But it helped give me the upper hand against hoods and thugs a number of times. Even if you seldom use it, I’d feel comfortable with you having it. Make me proud, son.”

     The old man was right. Randy never once used the club in the modern Rangers: that organization which had cars and radios and backup officers.

     But these days, in what Randy sometimes called the “post-modern Rangers,” the club was a tool which came in handy quite often.

     Randy’s present line of work was vastly different than his old one. And with new types of missions and objectives came new tactics.

     As the footsteps drew away from him, the Ranger slipped around the tree and stole up behind the sentry. Since his eyes had been closed for several minutes, his pupils were completely dilated. He was able to clearly see the shadow of the man as he crept up behind him. Clearly enough to land a clean blow against the back of the man’s skull, just above the neck.

     He dropped like a rock without a sound.

     The sound the blow made, a healthy
thunk
, was almost thunderous in the calm of the night. But Randy knew it couldn’t be heard at all a hundred, or even fifty yards away.

     He knew he had to be quick. He had to drag and carry the man the fifty yards back to the tree line, over the range fence and across the blacktop, then tie him up and gag him, before he came to.

     Luckily Randy was a man who was strong and fit and in the prime of his life. When most others ate whatever stale and fattening food they could find in the back of trucks or the back of their pantries, Randy ate smart. His diet was mostly rabbits and squirrels he shot. The venison he turned into jerky and stashed around various Texas cities a couple of times a year. The trout and catfish he caught on the rare days he had a couple of hours to kill. And rich plants from the earth. Fruits and vegetables and beans.

     He was stronger than nearly every man he knew. And it had saved his life on more than one occasion.

     Randy was a kind man as well. Most lawmen in his position would have dragged the unconscious badman to the fence, and then dragged him over the center strand of barbed wire.

     But not Randy. Randy stood the man up and hefted him over his shoulders in a classic fireman’s carry, then walked over to the fence with him and leaned over it. As gently as possible he lowered the dead weight of the man onto the other side of the wire, then tenderly dropped him into the dirt on the other side.

     He hopped the fence, then dragged him to the tree line. Again, in a humane way, his arms wrapped beneath his prisoner’s armpits.

     Once in the forest he found a sturdy tree, then took the backpack from his back and opened it. He took a roll of gray duct tape and a sturdy hemp rope.

     Two minutes later the man was gagged, bound, and tied securely to a tall pine tree. He wouldn’t be very comfortable. Especially if it was several hours before Randy had a chance to come back for him.

     But he’d survive, and would be none worse the wear for his ordeal.

     And he’d likely never know it, but he was lucky as well.

     Many lawmen would have killed him outright as a matter of convenience. Simply because it was easier than moving him, tying him up, and going back for him later.

     But Randy wasn’t like most other lawmen.

     Randy was a Ranger, and one of their best at that.

-17-

     By the time Randy doubled back and had the second sentry in sight, the man was getting antsy. He’d moved farther inland, and was now a hundred feet from the fence line.

     He knew instinctively that the sentry wouldn’t be watching the area between himself and the ranch house. He’d be focusing on the area outside the fence- just off the property, as he paced back and forth waiting for his overdue partner to return.

     Randy knew he didn’t have much time left. He’d hoped that the first man was lackadaisical in his job. That he wasn’t always prompt about returning on time. That he was the type of man who would sit down and smoke a cigarette, or take a short nap, or take his sweet time doing his business in the woods.

     But Sentry Number One wasn’t that way, judging by the behavior of Sentry Number Two. The man left behind was pacing back and forth and muttering to himself.

     The muttering would make it easier for Randy to sneak up behind him.

     The man’s pacing and constantly changing direction certainly wouldn’t.

     But Randy had an idea.

     He passed the man by almost the length of a football field before turning ninety degrees and heading back to the fence.

     Along the way, he paid particularly close attention to the bottoms of his feet. It was as though he was searching for something he couldn’t see in the dark.

     And indeed, that was exactly what he was doing.

     Just before he got back to the fence, he found it. Beneath the bottom of his right boot was a rock, roughly the size and shape of his closed fist. It would be perfect.

     Once back at the fence, Randy turned again and headed west. His intent was to sneak up behind his prey, but he’d have to be careful. Since the sentry was pacing back and forth, he’d spend half his time walking in Randy’s direction. If his night vision was superior to Randy’s, there was a chance he might see Randy first.

     But Randy had to chance it. He was already committed to this particular plan. There simply wasn’t time to back off and come up with a better one. And the longer he waited, the more chance the sentry would fire off a shot to call for help in locating his missing partner.

     He crept as close as he dared, staying low to the ground to make himself harder to see. Also to make himself a smaller target in case the sentry saw him first and started shooting.

     At forty yards he saw movement. He focused his eyes on the spot and could make out the dark shape of a man, against a slightly lighter background. At that distance it was impossible to tell whether the man was walking toward him or away from him.

     Randy froze and watched, until he determined the figure was getting larger and not smaller. He hugged the ground, silently praying the man didn’t spot him. His gun was still holstered, since he hadn’t planned on using it. Even worse, it was strapped in, in case he had to struggle with his quarry.

     Abruptly, the man turned and started walking away from Randy.

     Randy was up and in pursuit, taking large steps but trying to gauge his footfalls to coincide with the sentry’s. His Ranger training and common sense told him he was less likely to be heard that way.

     The sentry walked seventy two yards and came to another stop. He started to turn, but never had the chance. Just as he started to pivot, the full weight of Randy’s billy club came down at a sharp angle against the base of his skull.

     Like his partner, he went down without so much as a grunt.

     Randy had planned to toss the rock to divert the man’s attention if he had to. But it wasn’t necessary, and he let the rock roll out of his other hand and onto the ground.

     Randy repeated his process of half an hour before and fireman-carried the hood to the fence, then gently deposited him onto the other side.

     Twenty minutes later, the man was secured, his back pressed tightly against the trunk of a large elm.

     And Randy was off again in search of another pair of sentries.

-18-

     It was almost four hours before Randy finally returned to the camp. Sara had been worried at first, but trying to place her concerns for her new friend out of her mind.

     After all, she hadn’t heard any gunshots, or of men yelling. She hadn’t heard a thing. It was deathly still, and unnervingly quiet, at their secret campsite in the woods.

     At one point she wondered if he’d gotten lost trying to find his way back to the camp. Finding their roost in heavy woods was a tough task even in the daytime. At night it had to be many times harder.

     Then she decided that, no, Ranger Randy wouldn’t get lost. He was a professional in every way she’d seen thus far. Surely if anyone could navigate in dense black forest it would be him.

     But then anything was possible. She resolved to herself not to let him live it down if he did indeed get himself lost.