The Slavers Page 8

  It was like that all day. By nightfall we were close to the rim of the dry lake.

  We watered the animals, took off the saddles for a spell, then put them on again. It was possible that our two Indian-taking friends would get nerve enough to double back in the dark. We kept the animals ready to travel in a hurry. There was nothing to make a fire—if we were green enough to want to make a fire.

  I can do without a smoke when I have to. Ganado rolled himself in his blanket and slept while I drank a little of the mescal and chewed on a cold cigarette. The day’s heat worked its way out of the rock and sand, and after that it got cold. A couple of times, while Ganado slept, I thought I heard something.

  I didn’t have to wake Ganado.

  In the morning, we waited for good light to start across the dry lake. Now there was no sign of dust. In the middle of the lake, an hour after we started, we came on a dead man and a dead horse. The horse looked to have died of natural causes; the man lying not far from the horse had his throat cut.

  Ganado didn’t say anything—no need to say it. The dead horse belonged to the other feller, the feller who wasn’t there. There had been an argument. The dead feller had declined to let the horseless feller ride double. Maybe the horseless feller hadn’t bothered to ask. A quick slash with a knife was one way to make a point. One live man, one live horse.

  But it was nice seeing him dead. That dropped the odds of a successful ambush by half. The dead man was a boy on the pimply side of twenty. Like the rest of the dead slavers atop Black Mesa, now being disposed of by the peace-loving Zunis, his death had come as a big surprise. His hair was yellow and his eyes were open and the flies were having a Sunday dinner on the black wound under his chin. In the sky the buzzards were letting the meat ripen a bit before they lit down for the main course. A few days from now the boy slaver and the horse would be picked clean as Christmas goose on a poor farm.

  Ganado looked a mite disappointed, not having the time to wait around to see it for himself.

  We went after the other slaver. I knew he had to be old or young or a rum pot of any age; men like that always got left behind to watch the horses on a raiding party. Old or young, it would be right pleasant to end his life where he stood, then ride back easy the rest of the way and see how Elbert was doing.

  Most of the way across the dry lake, I was drinking from the first canteen when Ganado said, “There!”

  Another horse black against the white-gray lake bed. The animal wasn’t dead; from a distance I saw the poor brute raise its head. After that I took it as personal as Ganado. The son of a bitch had ruined the animal and gone off without killing it. Never mind that it wasn’t his animal. A horse will carry you the best he can; no man but a son of a bitch lets a horse die in pain.

  “This one belongs to me,” I told Ganado.

  We got to the crippled horse. It was like I thought. The son of a bitch had run the animal where no man should run any horse. The brute’s leg was broken, the splintered bone showing white through the black hide.

  A bullet between and above the eyes stopped the pain.

  We didn’t catch the horse-crippler on the lake. We were off the dry lake for some distance when we saw him staggering into a cluster of small rocks. I had checked for a rifle on the dead animal, and looked for it along the way, but I guess he still had it.

  We climbed down in a hurry when he ran for cover. He had the rifle, sure enough. The range from where he was didn’t make the rifle much use. That didn’t stop the fool from wasting bullets as fast as he could run them through the rifle. If he hit anything at that range it would be pure chance. Keeping out of range, we got back on our horses and rode a wide circle around him. Ganado went one way, I went the other. We walked the horses and didn’t make a sound or fire a shot.

  After the first wild burst of rifle fire, the slaver got himself a little more in hand. I guess he still thought he could make a long killing shot if he took his time. With a Sharps he might—not with a .44-40 Winchester. The bullets dropped short. He kept trying for three more bullets and then gave it up.

  It was getting on toward the hottest part of the day. I thought a cold glass of beer would be the ticket right about then. The slaver began to shoot off his mouth, keeping out of sight while he did it. Ganado passed me making the big circle, the big Sharps .50 in his hand.

  “If he doesn’t show himself soon we’ll go in from two sides,” I said.

  Maybe we could do that without getting shot. But I was counting on the slaver getting mad or scared enough to jump up and try to bait us into a head-on attack. He was too far away to see that Ganado was holding a Big Fifty Sharps and not a short-distance Winchester.

  The sun beat down like a hammer on anvil. We rode around him, far out, like men with nothing better to do. Cursing us to blue blazes, the slaver showed head and shoulders. I fired at him for show. The bullet came nowhere close to killing him.

  The yelling was blurred at that distance. I knew what he was telling us to do. Come in and fight, you yellow bellies!

  He jumped up, showing himself from the waist up, the name calling coming in a steady stream. Ganado had to make good with one shot from the big Sharps. Once he heard the Sharps he wouldn’t show himself again. We could get him anyway, but I was in a hurry to get back to that cold beer.

  The slaver turned to curse Ganado. The heavy Sharps boomed and a hunk of lead powered by ninety grains of powder knocked the slaver clear out of those rocks. Most anybody wound with a Big Fifty is fatal, and when a .50 caliber bullet hits an arm it usually takes it off.

  The slaver had a hole in his chest the size of a walnut; the hole in his back was big as a dinner plate. He was young like his murdered friend back on the dry lake. Somewhere a white haired lady would go on wondering what had happened to her wandering boy. She would never find out. The ravens and the buzzards and the coyotes would see to that.

  Ganado still had murder in his face. “Mount up,” I said. “The whiskey is thataway.”

  Chapter Eight

  Seven days after leaving Santa Fe we were back again. Getting back took an extra day, going at a more merciful pace, taking longer rests. Killing those fifteen men hadn’t dulled the big Indian’s silent anger. I’d even say he was more ready to kill than when we started.

  It was about noon when we got back to town, crossed the plaza and rode down Bedoya Street. I gave my horse to a Mexican who ran a stable down the street. I used my hat to whack off some of the dust. “You coming up?” I asked Ganado.

  For his own reasons, Ganado was none too fond of me. “You can tell it,” he said.

  “Sure,” I said. “You’re about to get drunk. Maybe that’s not a bad idea.”

  The Indian rode off without answering, and I took my somewhat weary bones up the stairs to Elbert’s office. I hoped I wouldn’t find him dead on the floor. Thinking of the shotgun, I knocked.

  Elbert was behind the desk shuffling papers, talking to himself.

  “Got anything to drink, Elbert?” I said.

  Elbert was so glad to see me, he jumped up and tried to grab me in a bear hug. I pushed him away, but I was grinning. “Leave off, pardner. You smell bad.”

  “Not worse than you, Carmody. I just smell— you stink. Christ! It’s good to see you.”

  Elbert uncorked a full bottle of rum and filled two dirty cups to the top. The cups were dirty and so was everything else. The room smelled as if Elbert hadn’t opened the window or been out of there the whole week I was gone.

  I didn’t say anything more until I had two full cups of rum warming the bottom of my belly. “You’re still alive,” I told Elbert. “I thought you might not be.”

  “Never mind that, Carmody. What happened out there.”

  I told him.

  “God—fifteen men,” Elbert said. “Did you give them any chance at all?”

  “Every chance in the world,” I said. “Even tried to read them the anti-slave law of 1868. They got bored halfway through.”

  “It�
��s not something to joke about, Carmody. All right, you had to do it. I still don’t like it. You know Long John’s been asking questions about you.”

  “Let him ask. How are things this end? You got the papers to beat Judge Gratz over the head? How is that fine old gentleman, by the way?”

  “Still down in Alamogordo,” Elbert said. “Gratz must like it there, been there so long. But I sent him a letter the day you left. Told him what I’d do if he didn’t quit stalling and get back here. I figure the letter will fetch him back if only to hold me in contempt.”

  I got up off the bed and opened the window. “You think the Judge would issue a court order making you keep this place clean?”

  “Where’s Ganado?”

  “Starting on the second bottle by now. You sure you can hold that Indian in check? Just this minute he looked mad enough to take on the whole garrison. You know what Indians are like when they’re drunk.”

  “Ganado’s all right,” Elbert said.

  “Maybe,” I said. “What about Waycross and McKim?”

  “Nothing about them,” Elbert answered. “Haven’t even seen them. I saw Long John the day he was down this way asking questions about you. Long John used to say howdy. Now he doesn’t.”

  The rum made me hungry. Some of the chuck was left, and I set a pot of coffee to boiling while I fried the last of the bacon. Later, no hog, I finished my half of the bottle and rolled a smoke. “You do what you want, Elbert,” I said. “I’m about to sleep till morning.”

  I didn’t get to sleep that long, because on toward midnight a fist banging on the door woke me. Elbert was slumped across the desk snoring, the empty bottle beside his head. He went on snoring.

  I got off the bed and put myself out of the way of the door. “Marshal Buckman,” a voice said outside.

  It wouldn’t be hard to imitate Long John’s raspy voice. “You open the door,” I said, holding the double-barrel waist high. “You better be John Buckman when you do it.”

  “Put it away,” Buckman growled when he saw the shotgun. “I come to tell Masters his pet Indian is dead.”

  “Ganado?”

  “That’s the one, the big feller. Better wake the lawyer.”

  It took some hard slaps to get Elbert to open his eyes. He roared like a wounded bull before Long John finished telling it. I had to use all my weight to shove him back in the chair.

  I looked at Long John. So far only one thing was clear—the Indian was dead. “How is he dead?” I wanted to know. “Where? You know who did it?”

  Long John shook his head. Elbert called him a dirty liar and I told Elbert to shut up.

  Long John looked mean. “You call me that some other time, Masters, and we’ll see ...”

  Long John reined in his temper and got back to business. “You know anything about a bunch of men was murdered way west of the Rio? At a Zuni pueblo—Black Mesa, the name is?”

  “Never heard of the place.”

  Long John called me a liar.

  “You’re the liar, Buckman,” Elbert roared.

  I pushed him back in the chair.

  Long John said: “I don’t care about what happened at Black Mesa, Carmody. I only care when it starts trouble in Santa Fe. Don’t tell me you weren’t there. You and the Indian left town together. A storekeeper saw you together...”

  “Ganado didn’t say I was at Black Mesa.”

  Long John pulled on his droopy mustache.

  “Didn’t have to say it. Today you rode into town together. Then the Indian got drunk the way he always does in town, only this time it was a killing drunk. I got people can say they saw him that way, making all kinds of threats against Thatcher McKim. Before that he was yelling about doing to McKim the same as he done to fifteen men on Black Mesa. You were with him, Carmody.”

  “Wrong, Marshal,” I said. “Just happened Ganado left town same time I did. A funny thing, I met him again, the way back. That’s my story unless you can wake up those poor murdered boys on the mesa. Ganado wouldn’t say any different if he could. Now he can’t.”

  “Where is Ganado?” Elbert asked in a dull voice.

  “Downstairs on a horse,” the Marshal said. “Last thing I heard he rode out toward McKim’s place. That was about nightfall. Less than an hour ago a man came running to my house. Said a dead Indian roped to a horse was wandering along Wallace Street.”

  Elbert was quiet now and I let him get up. He went to the stove and rinsed out his mouth with cold coffee and spat out the window. He turned to look at the Marshal. “McKim did it or had it done. Now what are you going to do about it?”

  “Nothing,” the Marshal answered. “No proof. Even with proof no jury would convict. You ever hear of a jury hanging a white man for killing an Indian? Anyway, that boy of yours was a drunk and a troublemaker, and by his own words a killer. Never mind that. Maybe—just maybe—those men on the mesa had it coming. The point here, Masters, is you got that Indian killed. You squat up here making trouble, but it’s the drunk Indian does the dying.”

  Elbert had no handy answer for that.

  It didn’t matter a whole lot. I asked Long John how they’d killed Ganado.

  “The worst way they could,” the Marshal stated. “What the hell does it matter how they did it? He’s dead and he’s downstairs. You want the body or not?”

  We went downstairs after the Marshal to take charge of Ganado. Looking at what they had done to him, it was hard to call the corpse by any name. The body was hung over the saddle, wrists roped to ankles, and covered now with a blanket. I knew the blanket was Long John’s idea.

  The Marshal pulled the blanket away and I used my knife to cut the ropes. The Marshal or Elbert didn’t help and I staggered getting the big Indian off the horse. Elbert was making noises in the back of his throat.

  “You like what you see?” Long John asked Elbert.

  I put an edge on my voice. “Drop it, Buckman.”

  Long John’s temper flared in his eyes, but he didn’t say a thing. He stood back and watched, an old man with no money, no friends, on the long downhill slide. I didn’t think he was taking money from McKim; he sure as hell wasn’t straining to get on our side.

  Elbert kept away from the body, still making strangled sounds in his throat. They had killed the Indian the worst way, the slow way. Now I come from Texas and I’ve been some other places since then. I’ve seen the things they do to blacks and Mexicans when the spirit moves them. Riding into Goldfield, Nevada, early one morning I stopped to look at a dead Chinaman hanging from a windmill. Nothing I’d seen in those places measured up to what they had done to Ganado. The hands and feet were burned so the toes and fingers were gone. The nose was cut off, the eyes gouged out. They didn’t stop when they castrated him; some sport had opened his belly from hip to hip. Then, following the fine old custom to the letter, they had pulled him up on a tree limb and used him for target practice. I guess they would have finished the night’s work with a coal oil bath and a match if they hadn’t wanted one and all to know that this here lump of tortured flesh was the Indian Ganado.

  I walked over to Elbert and put a tight grip on his arm. He didn’t try to shake it loose; just kept staring at the body.

  “What do you want to do?” I said again. “Bury him as he is? Doesn’t make much difference.”

  Elbert’s voice was dead as Ganado. “No, not as he is. Mr. Olivera will bring a coffin.”

  I pushed Elbert away from there. “Go and tell him that,” I said. “I’ll wait here.”

  Usually, there were people on Bedoya Street any time of night; now there was nobody. “Go on, Elbert,” I said.

  Long John came over and stood beside me. “They did a nice job,” I said. “Folks in Texas are going to be jealous when they hear about the job you New Mexicans did on this Indian.”

  Long John asked me what part of Texas I was from.

  “The Big Bend and other parts. When I was a kid you were sheriff in Del Rio. More than twenty years ago.”

  Long
John’s voice sounded as droopy as his lip whiskers. “Yeah, Del Rio was all right. The Rio Grande is a real river when it gets that far east. You been there lately?”

  “About two years ago,” I said, thinking men trade small talk in funny places. “Town’s wild as ever.”

  Long John sent a jet of tobacco juice not many feet from the corpse. “Not when I left it, Carmody. When I left there it was nice and quiet. So quiet they quit paying my wages and hired some farmer at quarter the money. A man moves around. Santa Fe suits me fine mainly because I’m getting too old to move on.”

  “Say it straight, Marshal,” I said.

  Long John Buckman said it straight: “I can’t let you mess things up, Carmody. Do a feller a favor. Ride out of Santa Fe and take that lawyer with you. You stay here it’s got to come to shooting betwixt the two of us. I’d surely hate to gun a man likes Del Rio as much as I do.”

  I didn’t like Del Rio and hadn’t said I did. It wasn’t like John Buckman to get sentimental while he was making a threat, and I wondered just how fast this old man really was. Looking fast didn’t mean much. A town tamer, like, say, Bill Tilghman never looked fast and yet he stayed fast as a snake right up to the time he was crowding sixty and was killed from ambush.

  I didn’t think Long John saw me looking at his hands.

  “You been warned and advised,” he said. “It’s been nice here in Santa Fe till Masters started up, till you showed up to help him. Don’t you go telling me about Goddamned stinking Indians. My business is keeping the peace here and now ...”

  Down the street a wagon creaked out of the stable where my horse was quartered. Olivera, the stableman, built coffins on the side. I expected to see Olivera driving the wagon; instead, I saw Elbert on the seat. The mules pulled the wagon without any instructions from Elbert. Elbert sat there, the lines loose in his hand, staring at nothing, and the mules would have pulled the wagon to the plaza, and beyond it, if I hadn’t stopped them. Elbert didn’t get down.