A Good Day to Die (21 page)

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Authors: William W. Johnstone

BOOK: A Good Day to Die
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“Fine,” Oxblood said.
Barton circled around to the front of the column, casual-like, standing in the middle of the street facing them.
“That's the second time you've gotten between me and the town,” Vince said, scowling.
“That's what they pay me for,” Barton stated. “I want to make sure we're straight on a few things, Vince.”
Clay rubbed his chin with the back of his hand. Quent lost the dreamy-eyed look, becoming aware of his surroundings for the first time in a while. His small round eyes widened, then narrowed. Behind the Staffords, a couple horses pawed the dirt with front hooves.
Sensing resistance, Vince Stafford didn't like it. “Straighten this out for me. Where were you when Bliss got kilt?”
“It was all over when I got there,” Barton said.
“My boy was shot down like a dog in the streets of your town.”
“He wasn't no boy. He was a man carrying a gun, and he knew how to use it.”
“The gambler who shot Bliss, he in jail?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Bliss was pushing it. Damon wanted to walk away, but Bliss drew first. You can't jail a man for defending himself. That's the law.”
“I don't rightly care for your kind of law. I follow a higher law. ‘Blood shall have blood,' like the Good Book says. An eye for an eye.” Vince spat.
“You didn't bring your whole outfit to town to take Bliss back home. What do you figure on doing?” the sheriff asked.
Vince reached down to one side of the saddle.
Barton almost slapped leather and drew until he realized the man was reaching for a looped circle of hempen rope. The coiled lariat was fixed to a saddle ring.
“I'm gonna hang the man who kilt my boy,” Vince cried, brandishing the rope, shaking its looped length in the air. “But don't get yourself in an uproar, Sheriff. I'm gonna do everything right and proper, the good old-fashioned Hangtown way. I'm gonna slip the noose around the gambler's neck by myself and stretch him from a limb of the ol' Hanging Tree.” Vince's voice quivered with malice, reveling in it.
Spewing little flecks of spittle, he went on. “That ain't all I'm gonna do. I'm gonna fix the whore what led my boy astray, too—cut her face up good and proper so that after this day no man's ever gonna be able to look at her again without puking!”
Clay started. “That's crazy talk, Pa! The girl had nothing to do with it!”
Vince turned on him. “How do you know? Was you there? Hell, no! So just keep your trap shut.”
“I know Bliss, the way he was around women. Everybody knows! He saw a pretty girl he just had to have her, come hell or high water. If it wasn't this one, it would have been another,” Clay quipped.
“But it was this one,” Vince pressed. “What's her name? Francine? Sure, that's it. Francine. He talked about her enough, back at the ranch. Francine! She's the gambler's whore and because of her Bliss is dead and she's got to pay! They both do, and they will.”
Clay's face reddened, teeth bared in a half snarl. “I didn't come out here to fight women, I came to get my brother's killer and—”
“You came because I told you! And you'll do like I tell you! And that's the end of it,” Vince hollered, “unless you feel like bucking me, boy. Do you?”
After a pause, Clay made a visible effort to control himself. “You're the boss, Pa.”
“Damned right, and don't you forget it.”
Quent snickered. “Never learn, do you, Clay? There's no going agin' Pa once he's got his mind set—”
“Shut up, Quent. I take it from Pa, but I don't have to take it from you.”
“Both of you shut up.” Still holding the coiled lariat, Vince rested one hand on top of the saddle horn, put the other hand on it and leaned forward, glaring down at Barton, impassive and unmoved. “Now what do think of that, lawman?”
“I think Clay's talking sense and you ought to listen to him,” Barton said. “Bracing Damon is one thing, but hurting a woman, cutting her, that's another. That's awful raw, even for Hangtown. Folks in these parts don't cotton to a man putting a bad hurt on a woman.”
“Respectable women, not whores.”
“Whores, too. There ain't so many of them around here that we can afford to lose one, especially not a pretty one.”
That got a couple chuckles from the men, mostly the top guns who didn't give a damn and the riders too far in the back for Vince to know it was them laughing.
Vince got more irritated. “I showed my hand. Now it's time for you to lay your cards faceup on the table, Sheriff. What's your call? You plan on bucking me?”
“I didn't get this badge for being dumb,” Barton began.
Some of the tension left Clay's face. Dan Oxblood smiled knowingly. Some of the men nodded their heads.
“I'm hired to protect Hangtree. I ain't so much of a fool as to risk the town getting tore up and innocent folks hurt and maybe killed to save Damon Bolt's neck. 'Sides, Damon's pretty good at taking care of himself ... and he's got some friends with him.”
“That's our lookout,” Clay said.
“The gambler and the whore, I want 'em both,” Vince said. “And I'll have 'em.”
Clay frowned. “Damn it, Pa, he's going along! You don't got to rub his face in it.”
“He's got to go along all the way.”
“There's a condition,” Barton drawled.
“I don't hold with conditions,” Vince said.
“You want to fight a private war with the Golden Spur, that's your business. I may not like it, but I have to take it. But it's strictly between your crowd and his. Keep it private and the rest of the folks safely out of it.”
“Nobody'll get hurt unless they get between me and what I'm after. If they do, God help 'em because I surely won't.” Vince looked skyward, as if calling on the Lord to witness the truth of his words.
“Don't let things get out of hand, Vince.”
“Suppose they do? Who's gonna stop me, you?”
“That's right.” Barton nodded.
After a pause Oxblood laughed without mirth, breaking the deathly silence. “Whew! You do speak right up, don't you, Mack?”
The Ramrod riders flashed dark looks and muttered harsh words.
“Easy, men,” Clay cautioned.
Vince gawked in disbelief. “I must've heard wrong.”
“You heard right,” Barton advised. “Listen up, Stafford, and that goes for the rest of you, in case any of y'all are hard of hearing.”
Quent swelled up, stung. “That's Mister Stafford to you—”
“Shut the hell up. Now get this. No man buffaloes Hangtree, no matter how big he thinks he is or how many guns he's got riding for him. It's been tried before and it never took and it ain't gonna take now.”
“Big talk for one man,” Vince said, sneering.
“I ain't alone.” Barton turned, angling his body so he faced Vince and West Trail Street, careful not to turn his back on the Staffords. The rest of the bunch wouldn't make a play unless and until one of the family got the ball rolling first, he figured.
Raising his left arm slowly and deliberately, so as to not spook anybody into shooting, Barton waved a hand in the air. Armed men poured into the street from the front and side doors of the Cattleman Hotel and the Alamo Bar across from it.
“Don't nobody get trigger-happy, gents. You don't want to spoil your fun,” Barton said.
Figures armed with rifles, shotguns, and handguns massed in the center of the street, filling it. A crowd of thirty or forty men stood facing the Ramrod riders. The hard-core center of them were Dog Star toughs, paired with hard-bitten ranchers and cold-faced townmen. Together, they made up the Hangtown militia.
“What's this? What do you think you're pulling?” Vince Stafford blustered.
“Hangtree got through the war without being sacked and burned by Yankees, deserters, or outlaws, and we aim to keep it that way. Them folks over there ain't minded to stand by and let the town go to Hades just because you or anyone else wants to run roughshod over it,” Barton said.
“Seems to me you made a slight mistake in your calculations, Sheriff,” Clay said, keeping his voice level. “Them fighting shopkeepers and store clerks and whatnot of yours—real bad hombres, I'm sure—they're down there. But you're here, all alone with us.”
“I'll take my chances,” Barton said, unimpressed.
“You're taking them, by God!” Vince cried.
Barton had been unsure whether the likes of Wade Hutto and Squint McCray could marshal their respective factions and get them in the street when the time came. That was the chancy part. Now that the confrontation had come to a head he felt cool, ready. “Them bad hombres you're making small of have homes and businesses to protect against looting and burning. Most of them were in the war and they can take care of themselves if they have to. See that they don't have to.
“Go fight your fight with Damon. That's your business. It's the Ramrod against the Spur and that's where it better stay. If it gets out of bounds, slops over where it can foul our nests—we'll make it our business. Savvy?”
Quent's open hand hovered over the butt of his holstered gun. “Almighty sure of yourself, ain't you?”
Barton eyed him, fixing him with a cold stare. “Just as sure as I am that you ain't gonna pull that gun, you overgrowed sack of horse droppings.”
“Why, you dirty—”
“Don't try him, Quent,” Clay said quickly.
“Back off, boy!” Vince yelled.
Quent held the pose for a beat, then slowly lowered his hand to his side, well clear of the gun.
“What I thought,” Barton said, sneering.
“Don't crowd your luck,” Vince cautioned. “Don't crowd us.”
“You'll have your hands full with Damon and his pals. You're too smart to go against him and the town both,” Barton said. “And don't forget about the Yanks at Fort Pardee. Give them an excuse to hunt you down and they'll clean up on the whole bunch of you and confiscate your herd and ranch for their troubles.”
A voice from one of the militia men in the street called, “You okay, Sheriff?”
“Yeah!” Barton replied, not taking his eyes off the Ramrod riders. “I'm gonna walk out of here now and tell the folks you know the facts of life and will abide by them.”
“I ain't forgetting this,” Vince said feelingly.
“I can stand it,” Barton retorted.
“Git and be damned. Keep out of my fight and you won't have any of ours.”
“Done.” The sheriff gave them all one last hard look. “Wonder how many of you will be alive by this time tomorrow?”
Barton turned and started walking, moving at a steady pace. It was so quiet he could hear the grit of street dirt scuffling against his leather boot soles. He fought to keep his shoulders and back muscles loose and untensed, but it was hard. He was half expecting bullets to come tearing into him any second.
He kept on walking, eyes front, not looking back. Drawing abreast of the Golden Spur, he cut a side-glance at it.
Johnny Cross stood framed in the doorway, arms folded on top of one of the hinged batwing doors. He rested his chin on his arms, yellow cat eyes unblinking, smiling lazily at the sheriff as he walked past.
Nearing the militiamen, a wall of vague oval faces began resolving into recognizable faces: town boss Wade Hutto, his top gun Boone Lassitter, Hutto's brother-in-law Russ Lockhart, Deputy Smalls, Squint McCray and a couple of his cousins, Karl from the gunstore, others.
Hutto moved forward to meet him. “How'd it go, Sheriff?”
“Vince listened to reason,” Barton said, glad to note his voice held steady, without a quaver.
“That's great! Good work, Mack,” Hutto enthused.
“The Ramrod bunch'll toe the line, but we still need to keep our guns loaded and ready to smash them down at the first sign of trouble—which could be soon—anytime.”
“Whew! I don't mind telling you, that was a real nail-biter.”
“You should've seen it from my end.”
Trouble came sooner than Barton expected. It came without warning out of the west, in a mass of rushing horses, gunfire and war whoops—all accompanied by the ringing of church bells.
T
HIRTEEN
It was mid-afternoon when Sam Heller and Lydia Fisher reached Rancho Grande. One of the biggest spreads in the county, in all north central Texas for that matter, the ranch was bordered on the north by Old Mission Road and the south by the upper fork of the Liberty River.
Before getting too deep into Grande land, Sam and Lydia were intercepted by a band of vaqueros who patrolled the lush grasslands to deter trespassers, rustlers, and marauders. Ranch master Don Eduardo Castillo had no love for intruders on his private domain, especially Anglos, all of whom he lumped under the label “Texans” and whom he resented for what he felt was their steady encroachment on his land.
The outriders closed in. Mexican-Americans, they were hard men with grim, unfriendly faces under broad-brimmed sombreros and weapons—guns and rifles—held at the ready.
“I heard the Grande riders shoot white folks on sight,” Lydia said.
“Not true,” Sam answered. “Just pesky yellow-haired gals with braids,” he added dryly.
Lydia looked unsure as to whether or not he was joking.
Sam was no stranger to the ranch, thanks to previous involvements with the Castillo clan. He was recognized by the jefe, boss of the vaquero band. Sam spoke a few sentences to him in rough, broken Spanish, a language he was learning but still a long way from mastering. He got his message across, though, especially the dreaded word
Comanche
.
Of no less dread import was the name
Mano Rojo—
Red Hand.
The jefe's face stiffened, his dark-eyed gaze hardening. Some of the vaqueros muttered curses. All checked their weapons and peered into the distance in search of war parties.
Mexicans and Comanches had been mortal enemies for more than three hundred years, since the first armor-shelled conquistadors ventured north from Mexico City across the Rio Grande. The rancho had battled for survival against the Comanches for over a century.
The jefe issued a series of rapid-fire comands to his men, who leaped into action. One wheeled his mount, spurring it southward at top speed toward the rancho, hidden from view by some low ridges. He raced all out to give warning.
Two more vaqueros peeled off from the group, pointing their horses in opposite directions, one going east, the other going west, galloping away to spread the alert to other working parties tending the herds on the grazing lands.
The jefe and those remaining escorted Sam and Lydia to the ranch. Twenty minutes of hard riding brought them in sight of the main settlement.
Here was the core, the inner citadel of Rancho Grande. A sizeable tract of land was enclosed by thick adobe walls ten feet tall. The walls were pocked and cratered by rounds fired in numerous battles, some old, others of more recent vintage.
The main gate faced south. A set of stout, ironbound dark wooden double doors stood open, allowing a view within. Square-faced columns topped by an adobe arch bracketed the entrance. A bronze bell hung from a black iron chain in the center of the archway. A dirt road stretched across the flat fronting the portal.
Sam, Lydia, and their vaquero escort rode in under the arch, through the gate, and into a wide courtyard. Stung by the advance rider's warning, the ranchero was abuzz with activity, swift and purposeful.
Within high, curved adobe walls, parapets accessed by stairways served as shooting platforms. Sentries on the walls scanned the horizon for sign of hostiles; none had yet appeared. Two-man teams toted crates of rifle ammunition, each man gripping a rope handle attached to a short end of the case. Laboring under the heavy load, they lugged the crates up the stairs onto the ramparts, broke open the lids with rifle butts, and began handing out boxes of cartridges. Riders rushed in and out of the main gate, going here and there on various vital errands.
The dirt-floored outer courtyard gave way to the stone-paved inner courtyard of a plaza. At its center was a wide, shallow adobe water basin and fountain, fed by a well. Bordering the plaza were outbuildings: stables, a tool and equipment shed, and storehouses filled with supplies of corn and sides of dried, smoked meat.
Beyond the fountain rose the main building, a three-story structure. An imposing edifice that fronted south, its slanted roof was shingled with orange ceramic tiles. Across the whitewashed adobe and stucco front black ironwork grilles hung on the windows. Ornate rails and balustrades covered the second floor balcony. Lush, extensive gardens and arcades lay on the west side of the building.
The jefe escorted Sam and Lydia into the inner courtyard. Nodding to Sam and raising a hand in curt salutation, the grim-faced chief turned, riding across the space and out the gate.
Sam and Lydia dismounted, holding their horses' reins. They were met by Hector Vasquez, the segundo, the foreman of the ranch.
He was topped by an outrageously oversized, broad-brimmed sombrero. Its tall crown narrowed to a curved peak, looking like an inverted horn of plenty. Spilling from under it was plenty of hombre, a bearish, barrel-chested, big-bellied man. A pear-shaped face was framed by masses of shaggy, salt-and-pepper hair. Dark black eyes looked out from a bronzed visage whose cheekbones and cheeks were pitted by remnants of long-ago smallpox scars.
He wore a black bolero jacket with silver trim and frogging, a white embroidered shirt whose front was strained by a massive swelling belly, black bell-bottom pants, and silver-spurred leather boots. Worn low under his big gut was a pair of six-guns in soft leather buscadero holsters.
“He looks like a bandit,” Lydia whispered.
“He was, once,” Sam said. “Don't worry, he's perfectly respectable now. Probably hasn't killed anybody this week.”
Lydia looked at him out of the corners of her eyes.
“I'm joking.”
Actually, there was no knowing if Vasquez had killed anybody lately or not. He'd obey cheerfully and with a will if ordered to do so by his patron, ranch master Don Eduardo.
Shiny sunburst rowels as big as silver dollars sparkled at the ends of his spurs as Vasquez made his way to them, raising a hand in greeting. “Trouble always follows you, gringo. What misery do you bring now?”
“Nothing a man like you can't handle, large one,” Sam said.
“True. But I like to know who I'm shooting at.”
“Comanches, mucho Comanches.”
“So you say. Senor Diego says maybe you got scared by a few
los bravos Indios
, that's all.”
Sam looked around at the bustling courtyard. Brawny, heavyset women in white blouses and colorful skirts filled ollas—water jugs—at the basin and carried them inside the hacienda. Gangly boys in baggy white shirts and pants and woven sandals, bent double under the weight of massive bundles of firewood and stowed them away in the outbuildings. Riders came and went, stable hands saddling and unsaddling horses.
Indicating the urgent movement going on around them, Sam said, “They seem to be taking it seriously enough. And you?”
“I think maybe there is going to be a fight,” Vasquez said, grinning toothily. A fight was okay with him.
“Good thinking,” Sam said.
“And ... the señorita?” the segundo said, eyeing Lydia. “Who is she?”
“The last of her family. Comanches hit their ranch in the hills today,” Sam said.
“Aiiee!
Pobrecito
, poor little one. A great misfortune for one so young.”
“Old enough to kill a jefe of los Indios.”
Vasquez gave the girl a second look, longer and more appraising. “So? Well, I expect no less from a friend of yours, young or old.”
Sam handled the introduction. “Hector, meet Lydia Fisher. Lydia, this is Senor Vasquez, ramrod of Rancho Grande.”
Bending forward from the waist, Vasquez executed a courtly bow. “Welcome to our home, señorita. I am sorry for your loss.”
“Thanks ...
gracias,
Senor Vasquez.” Lydia stuck her hand out for a handshake. It all but disappeared inside Vasquez's massive bear paw of a hand as he clasped hers lightly, shaking it.
Going to Dusty, Sam took his flat wooden gun case down from the side of the saddle. “I'll take this. And this.” He reached for a rolled-up dark garment tied in place like a bedroll behind the back of the saddle and tucked it under his arm.
“Will you see that our horses are taken care of? They've had a long, hot ride,” Sam said.
“It shall be done.” Vasquez whistled, catching the eyes of a couple stable boys, who came on the run.
Lydia took her rifle from the saddle and held it under one arm.
“You will not need that here, señorita,” Vasquez said.
“I ain't letting go of it till the last Comanche is killed or quits,” Lydia said, her face set in stubborn lines.
“As you will,” Vasquez said, nodding approvingly. “A fit companion for you, gringo.”
The stable boys led the horses away. “Will Brownie be okay?” Lydia asked anxiously. “He's all I got now, him and the rifle.”
“He'll be fine. I wouldn't leave Dusty if I thought differently,” Sam said.
“Please come with me to the hacienda, if you will,” Vasquez invited. He started toward the big house, Sam and Lydia following.
Sam eyed the fountain longingly. Hot, tired, and thirsty, he wanted nothing so much as to empty a jug of cool, clear water over his head. He resisted the temptation.
Rounding the basin, the trio followed a long, straight, flagged path leading to the entrance of the hacienda. The towering structure loomed over them as they neared it. Lydia followed close on Sam's heels. Vasquez knocked on the front door. It was opened by a servant woman.
“I'll leave you here, gringo.
Hasta la vista,
” Vasquez said.
“See you,” Sam said. He and Lydia stepped inside. The high front hall with tiled floors was cool. Closing the door, the servant turned and went deeper into the house, gesturing for Sam and Lydia to follow, murmuring, “
Por favor.
”
They went down a long hall with white-painted stuccoed walls showing dark brown wooden rafter beams and beam-ends. The walls were hung with spiky, ornate crucifixes and somber portrait paintings in elaborate gilded frames. The portraits were so dark with age their subjects could barely be made out. An unlit iron chandelier hung on a chain from the ceiling.
Lydia said in a hushed voice, “It's like a palace.”
“In its way, it is,” Sam agreed.
The servant paused at the entrance of the great hall. “Señor Diego will see you now, señor. There are some refreshments prepared for the señorita. If she would be so good as to accompany me?”
Lydia grabbed Sam's arm. “I want to stay with you.”
“It's all right. I won't be long,” Sam said.
Lydia, unhappy and suspicious, allowed him to persuade her to go with the servant woman. She led Lydia down a side passage toward the rear of the house.
“Try not to shoot anybody,” Sam called after her, only half joking.
A manservant appeared at the threshold of the hall's rounded archway, motioning for Sam to enter. Sam followed him into the grand hall, a spacious, chamber two stories high. Stone pillars were set at regular intervals along whitewashed walls. Brightly colored woven tapestries and woolen blankets were hung as decorations. The long west wall was pierced by a row of tall, slender windows with peaked tops.
In the grand hall were Diego Castillo and Lorena Castillo Delgado.
Diego was the sole surviving scion of the Castillo bloodline. Age thirty, tall, slim, and elegant, he looked every inch the grandee, imperious and arrogant. He wore custom-tailored clothes with expensive decorative lace at the throat and cuffs, and imported boots of hand-tooled Cordovan leather.
His father, Don Eduardo Castillo, was the patron, the master of Rancho Grande. Thus Diego must remain “Señor Diego,” able to assume the honorific “Don Diego” only upon the death of his father. Don Eduardo enjoyed excellent health; a fact Sam guessed gave little pleasure to his impatient, ambitious son.
Lorena Castillo, born Lorena Delgado, was the childless widow of Don Eduardo's firstborn son. Originally from Mexico she lived at the ranch. She was dark with bold good looks and a sensational physique.
Masses of black hair fell past her shoulders, framing a wide, sculpted bronze face with wide brown eyes, and a full-lipped red slash of a mouth. She was garbed in a bolero jacket, starched white blouse, and tan riding breeches tucked into knee-high brown leather boots. She was smoking a small, thin black cigarillo and held a pumpkin glass of brandy.
She was a willful, passionate woman. Sam wanted to trust her. He trusted few women and fewer men. Diego he trusted not at all.
The manservant ushered in the newcomer, Diego dismissing him with a few words. Nodding acknowledgment of Sam's presence, Diego smiled thinly. “Ah, Señor Heller. Once again you grace us with your company.”

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