Warriors of the Night (15 page)

He opened his eyes to the night-shrouded
jacal
where he’d been left bound and gagged. His wrists were tied behind his back. The side of his head hurt like hell, but he was alive. As Ben’s eyes adjusted to the night, the moon momentarily emerged from behind a rain cloud and illuminated the interior of the roofless shell of the
jacal.
Ben was alive, all right, which was more than he could say for the two men propped against the wall. Ashworth and Harlan had been carried from the corral and left with Ben.

The lieutenant turned his eyes away from his grisly companions and managed to sit upright. His head throbbed and his lips felt bruised and puffy beneath the gag. The world momentarily reeled, then steadied itself. Ben had no idea how long he had been unconscious. Perhaps he had come to and drifted off more than once. No matter. It was night. The hour was impossible to tell. Those disturbing images he had seen in his mind’s eye left him confused and shaken and were slow to fade. But he didn’t have time to worry about them. Maybe later, when he was free and had rounded up a certain señorita and her desperados.

He struggled against the rawhide cords securing his wrists. His hands were numb and it took effort to move his fingers. In another half hour, he wouldn’t be able to feel a thing. If he was going to free himself it better be soon. He took his bearings and settled on a plan. A rawhide rope attaching his bound wrists to another set of bonds firmly imprisoning his ankles left him little choice but to awkwardly roll to the corner of the
jacal.
Once over, then twice, and then again before the fire-damaged remains of a crib dug into his ribs. A little extra discomfort didn’t matter now. He felt around on the dirt floor and sifted through straw and the pieces of a crib frame and a shattered stoneware cup half buried in mud and ashes. He cut himself, cursed, then with satisfaction realized he had found the shard of mirror.

Concentrating on his swollen fingers, he managed to grasp the jagged glass and, with his back to the wall, began to saw at the rawhide. It was slow going. Twice he dropped the shard, and only with maximum effort was he able to retrieve it.

Perspiration blinded him and dripped from his swollen features. His red hair was matted to his skull. Sweat streamed from every pore as he struggled to free himself. First one strand parted, then another, then a knot parted and a third strand. Seconds crawled past like hours. He lost his hold on the piece of mirror for the fourth time and, shifting his weight, accidently managed to break the shard into even smaller pieces.

Ben lowered his head. “Damn it,” he sighed, the gag muzzling his words. Anger welled in him, starting in the pit of his stomach and spreading like wildfire until he trembled with fury. Then a muffled growl sounded deep in his throat and increased in volume until it became an animalistic cry of rage. His muscles swelled and the remaining rawhide bindings cut into his flesh as he pulled and twisted. Then, with an audible snap, the rawhide parted and his hands were free. He tugged the gag from his mouth and bit away the last strands of rawhide cutting off the blood supply to his hands. Feeling slowly returned, as did the use of his fingers. He fumbled with the rawhide rope that was looped around his ankles. They hadn’t been as securely bound, and in a minute he had freed his legs and was standing. He wasn’t surprised to find his gun belt missing. No matter, he thought, I know where I can get another. Ben leaned against the wall and allowed the circulation to bring life to his limbs. Moonlight faded, obscuring the two corpses near the doorway. Cal Ashworth and Lester Harlan were no great loss. Ben doubted any tears would be shed over their fate, for indeed it was one both men had tempted. They had called the tune and now had paid the piper.

But Anabel and her armed escort were something else again. Ben McQueen resolved there’d be a reckoning. He intended to come calling on the señorita this very night, and to bring along a trio of Texas Rangers to act as chaperons.

He had waited long enough. Ben stumbled across the room and, with unsteady steps, entered the narrow, night-wrapped streets of La Villita. A dangerous place at night? Ben pitied any man who got in his way.

Peter Abbot watched an evening shower chase the townspeople from the plaza. Lanterns swung to and fro, as if casting lazy signals in the gentle wind. Sodden banners hung heavy above the wooden walkways. The Alameda Hotel and its main competitor, the Ridenour House, appeared to be doing a thriving business. An amber glow flooded the hotel porches as it steamed through unshuttered windows. A variety of well-dressed townsfolk, Anglo, German, or Mexican, mingled in the Alameda’s bar and the Ridenour House restaurant. The haciendas of the wealthy whose courtyards fronted the plaza also showed signs of celebration, despite the inclement weather.

Peter Abbot’s hand flew across the paper, leaving clean, quick, subtle streaks of charcoal that captured the plaza, now abandoned by the very townspeople who had decorated it and who only an hour ago had been dancing under the starless sky.

“She looks kind of like a lady, all decked out for the ball only to find her escort’s run off and there ain’t no dance,” Snake Eye said, peering over the artist’s shoulder. A restless man by nature, he had followed Peter Abbot onto the veranda that stretched across the front of the governor’s palace.

“You have the soul of a poet, Mr. Gandy,” Peter remarked. He had heard the man approach, but had never lost concentration as he hurried to capture the moment. His keen observation noted the smallest detail: the play of lamplight in the puddles; the stark darkness of the church and priest’s house, a sharp contrast to other homes; the cantina and the hotels, all of which bore the brunt of the festive crowds. The rowdy elements were contained in Main Plaza, and pity the drunken lout who lost his bearings and attempted to celebrate with the town’s leading citizens.

“‘Soul of a poet.’ Hell, don’t tell that to Virge. I never would hear the end.”

“The secret shall die with me,” Peter replied. The south walk needed a wash, and the subtlety of the background was too forced and needed to blend more with the shadows where the lamplight ended. Glancing up to study the angle of the hotel balcony overlooking the street, Pete caught a glimpse of movement in the plaza. Snake Eye noticed it as well. Gandy’s keen eyesight, however, had been honed not by a pursuit of art, but by years spent on the frontier dodging Comanche arrows and Mexican lancers.

“By jingo. It’s Ben McQueen,” he said. “I’d know that broad-beamed younker anywhere.”

Moments later, a rain-bedraggled Ben McQueen came lurching out of the night. He stumbled toward the porch, braced himself on a beam, and then stepped into the glare of the lantern Snake Eye held up before him. Ben was drenched to the skin, his lip was puffed, and the side of his head was swollen and caked with dried blood.

“Son, you look like you been kicked by a Missouri mule,” Snake Eye said.

“For chrissake, Ben, what the devil happened?” Peter asked. “And where’s Father? Is he all right?”

A cold chill creeped along Ben’s spine and he became more alert.

“Your father?” he gasped. “Why would I know anything about your father?”

“I saw it for myself,” Gandy interjected. “Carmelita showed up with a message that the general was supposed to hurry over to the padre’s. She told us you and the brown robe had gathered some of the town’s important Mexican leaders over at the priest’s house to discuss these here plans for Texas becoming a state.”

“And you let him go, just like that?” Ben groaned.

Snake Eye shrugged. “Seemed like the thing to do, after she showed us what you sent along to prove what she was about.”

Peter was obviously worried. He set his sketch paper and box of charcoal sticks aside. Behind his glasses, his expression betrayed his concern. His features were suddenly tightly drawn and bloodless.

Ben looked from one to the other. Then he turned and stared at the funereal and somber silhouette of the church spires and the adobe hacienda alongside.

“What do you mean?” he said in a hoarse whisper.

“She showed us the medal. The old woman said you gave it to her as proof of her story,” Peter told him.

Ben’s hand shot to his neck and ripped open his shirt to below his rib cage. He stared down at his rain-soaked chest. His heart plummeted. The pain from the rifle blow had been nothing compared to what he felt now. Peter had spoken the truth. The medal was gone!

F
ATHER ESTEBAN HAD AN
attentive audience at his kitchen table as he told his story. Sam Houston’s hardened expression reflected the gravity of the situation. The kidnapping of Matthew Abbot might well precipitate a war. Ben McQueen, his jaw swollen, stood behind Houston. Ben’s gaze smouldered as he shifted it from the priest to Carmelita. He had learned one of the bandits was her son. Ben was in a dark mood. He’d been played for a royal fool and lost not only the man he was supposed to protect, but the symbol of his family heritage. He reached to his chest as if unable to believe the medal was gone.

Captain Pepper sat at the end of the table, while Peter Abbot listened from a corner of the room near the back door. He sat on a stool and from time to time rubbed the bridge of his nose where his spectacles had rubbed a raw spot in his flesh. Virge Washburn had searched the priest’s house and checked on the church itself, to no avail. He’d dispatched Clay Poole and Snake Eye Gandy to La Villita several hours ago. Pepper wasn’t expecting much, but he went through the motions. It was a case of shutting the barn door after the horse had escaped, and he knew it.

“Dawn soon,” the padre observed aloud to no one in particular. The rain had stopped. Defying the spring rain’s legacy of soggy streamers and mud, the fiesta would begin early and no doubt continue well on into the night. Already a ragtag band consisting of a couple of guitarists, three fiddlers, and a man playing a brass trumpet had gathered on the balcony of the Alameda Hotel and were beginning to wake the residents in the surrounding neighborhoods with a cheerful tune.

Such a gay beginning was wasted on the people in the kitchen. Any reason for celebration had ended with the kidnapping of Matthew Abbot. Father Esteban glanced over his shoulder at Carmelita, who sat by the stove, her round features defiant in the face of her captors. The priest shook his head and faced Houston again.

“My sister brought the general over into La Villita. There he was taken prisoner, bound, and placed on a horse. They rode out late yesterday afternoon.” Esteban sighed and took a sip of coffee. “I learned this from Carmelita. My sister left without speaking to me. She knew I was against any such plan.” He glanced at Ben. “One of my sister’s vaqueros had your medal, Señor McQueen.”

“Why should she do such a thing? Who were the men with her?” Captain Pepper firmly asked.

Esteban nodded and folded his hands upon the table. It was obvious the entire affair deeply troubled him.

“Once as a child,” he began, “I went exploring a cave on my father’s ranch. Being a reckless youth, I managed to get myself stuck in a narrow passage several feet below ground. It was like being buried alive. I have never forgotten the experience of being trapped with no way out. Fortunately, my father’s
segundo
, Jorge, heard my cries. He found and freed me.” The priest gulped his coffee, set the stoneware on the table, and stared at the muddy silt at the bottom of the cup. His future looked about as bleak. “I am trapped again,
señores
, and truth is the only way back for me.” He searched the faces of the men in the kitchen, but found no compassion, only suspicion and anger. The priest did not blame them. “My name is not Obregon. It is Cordero. Anabel and I are the children of Don Luis Cordero.”

“My God,” Captain Pepper said.

“So El Tigre has cubs, eh?” said Sam Houston. “Well, well, well. Now that
is
something.”

“My father was a man of violence. A man of deep passions. And a long memory. He hated
norteamericanos
when first you came to this land. He chose to fight. He died trying to drive you out.”

“And you?” Houston’s deep voice demanded. The former president of the Texas Republic did not enjoy being roused from sleep. He had come to the priest’s house wearing a nightshirt tucked into nankeen trousers and a Colt revolver tucked in a wide leather belt that circled his waist. There were pouches beneath his eyes, but his gaze was rock steady.

“So the tiger of the mountains really is dead,” Captain Pepper muttered aloud.

“I am a priest. I take my vows most seriously. And I have tried to lead my flock, whatever the color of their skin, in the ways of peace,” Father Esteban said directly to Sam Houston. Then he lifted his gaze and looked at Ben. “Anabel was always his favorite. Daughters and fathers, this is a special bond. She is so much like him. The land is in her blood. Like his. And the pride… like his.”

“What does she hope to gain by kidnapping an official of the government of the United States?” Ben asked, keeping the emotion out of his voice. He wanted to sound as businesslike as possible. Anabel wasn’t the only one with pride.

“War,” Esteban replied. “The tension between Mexico and the United States is like kindling. This incident might well set the relationship ablaze.” The padre stood and crossed to the stove. He refilled his stoneware cup, taking care to ignore Carmelita’s accusing stare. “My father’s full name was Don Luis Cordero
de Tosta.
We are related by marriage to Santa Anna.”

“He’s in exile in Cuba,” Sam Houston pointed out. He had kept himself informed as to the whereabouts of his old enemy, the former president of Mexico.

“Should war break out, there are many factions who would see him restored to the presidency. That would revive our family’s fortune as well.” Esteban turned and held out his hands in a classic gesture of helplessness. “It was my father’s dying wish.” He glanced down at his brown robes. “My fortune is stored for me in heaven, not in Mexico City.” He returned to the table and sat opposite Houston, looking from the former president to the Ranger captain and then to Peter Abbot, who appeared distraught over his father’s kidnapping.