Maria's Trail (The Mule Tamer) (26 page)

His past deeds were difficult to verify. He had
spent some time, by his own account, as a lawman in Tombstone and, supposedly,
working for the Texas Rangers. Judging by his blustery ways and fondness for
hearing himself talk, everyone could pretty much agree that he likely hailed
from Texas.

Dick Welles was there and Arvel was glad for
it. He had known Dick since he arrived in Arizona. He was a good man, and a
fellow veteran of the GAR, a rare thing in this part of the country as the land
was populated mostly by former members of the confederacy.

Dick was a severe looking man with sharp
features and blue eyes the color of a glacier. He sat, perched on his horse
like a predatory bird, a dangerous hawk, ready to swoop down on his prey,
looking on at the collection of volunteers. He looked terse, always; never
cruel, but never friendly or smiling. He was the kind of man whom other men
obeyed unless they were too stupid to know better.

His hair went white by the time he was forty.
Once, his wife convinced him to dye it. So mortified was he at the outcome that
he shaved his head, preferring temporary baldness to the hubris of such
self-indulgence. He wore only brown or gray colored clothing of wool, as blue
seemed too gaudy to him, silk was out of the question. He never wore black as
he felt that this was the color reserved for undertakers and the clergy and he
fit neither of those criteria. He was never without a cravat and waistcoat. He
would wear a sack coat except in the worst heat.

Today he was dressed in his hunting clothes,
which consisted of his older regular clothes that were deemed worn enough to
get dirty. He was not a vain man, but proud enough to always be dressed
properly. His hat was the only exception. He’d gotten it just after arriving in
Arizona and it was once the color of honey. Now it was about as dirty as a hat
could get and the grosgrain band was colored with a hundred different sweat
stains. It was an exceedingly ugly hat and was incongruous with the rest of his
outfit, looking as if perhaps he’d mistakenly picked up the property of a
proper derelict, leaving a well-cared-for one behind. 

“Bad business, Dick.” Arvel extended his hand.

“Indeed. The girl said they tortured Olaf for
better than an hour. She just escaped after they walloped her good on the head
and left her for dead. They were in a state, whoopin’ and hollarin’, so busy
with the blood orgy that she jumped up when they were occupied and ran like
hell all the way to town.”

“How many do you reckon there are?”

“She thought ten or twelve. Half Indians and
half Mexicans, except for one white fellow, looked to be just running with
them, and not all that connected with the gang. He didn’t seem to take much
part in the really bad business.”

“It is all the same, lie down with dogs and get
up with fleas.”

The rest of the posse was made up of young
ranch hands from the area, and a fellow from the Tombstone newspaper. Word
traveled fast about this incident. Decapitation always makes for exciting news.

The young deputy was animated. He barked
orders, strutted amongst the posse, commenting on what was lacking in each
man’s outfit. He was particularly concerned about the two elderly gents joining
his expedition. He believed that fear was the best motivator. He eyed Arvel’s
kit doubtfully. “Sir, that mule is not going to slow our progress. We will be
forced to leave you behind if you cannot keep up.”

“Understood, Captain!” Arvel smiled.

“I am not a captain, Mister, and I’ll thank you
to take this a bit more serious. We’re after some dangerous fellows.” He looked
on with contempt at Arvel’s guns, consisting of his Colt thirty-six from his
days in the war, and a Henry rifle, ancient by the standards of the
well-equipped Texas lawman. Arvel wore his old garrison belt with the GAR
buckle. It was so worn by now, that
Grand Army of the Republic
was
nearly indiscernible.  His big knife looked as if it had come from the kitchen.
In fact, it had come from the kitchen and Dick Welles could swear it had
retained the odor of onions.

“You have a cap-n-ball six shooter?” The young
deputy sneered.

Arvel looked down at his revolver and smiled.
He was enjoying this thoroughly now. The young man did not wait for his reply
and began casting glances about in every direction, looking for evidence of
even more incompetence among this group of volunteers.

The little fellow eventually wandered off,
muttering something about having to nursemaid old-timers and kids. He lambasted
a few other members of the posse, poking and prodding their equipment and
generally making a fool of himself.

“Well, old-timer,” Arvel winked at Dick Welles,
“Let’s do our best at not being a nuisance on this expedition.”

They rode off, last in line, Sally with her
younger brother, Donny, in tow. Arvel always took two mules on an expedition,
as he had an abundant supply of the beasts, and thus was well provisioned in
the event that things would go wrong. With the little general in charge, he was
certain things would, indeed, go wrong.

They reached the homestead quickly; it was not
far from town. As they approached, they were struck with the sweet pungency of
burning human flesh. Tim Brown, nephew to the slain homesteaders, broke and
galloped hard to the site, rifle in hand. What he hoped to discover or achieve
by doing so, no one could tell. He was inconsolable when the rest of the posse
caught up with him. The scene was disturbing, even to the most hardened war
veteran, and most of these boys had little experience in such matters.

Except for the one girl who had escaped, every
member of the family was lying about the yard. The house had been burned, only
the scorched adobe fireplace and chimney remained. Dead livestock mixed with
the corpses. Olaf’s body smoldered in the dying embers of the fire-ring a
distance from the home. The fingers of his left hand had been torn, rather than
cut away, and they protruded from his gaping mouth. He had been scalped,
evidently while still alive. His throat had been cut so deeply that the head
was nearly off. The wife’s body remained relatively intact. They looked
everywhere for her head, but it could not be found. Two small children lay on
top of her; from the amount of gore soaked up by their mother’s dress, it was
likely they died last, bearing witness to the terrible execution of their
parents. The little girl, who was approaching her ninth birthday, had been
defiled.

Tim Brown was of no good use to the posse.
Arvel knew this would happen, and would not have permitted him to come along, if
he had any say in it. He decided the best thing to do was to talk to the deputy
as the young man was going to get himself and, perhaps, several others in a bit
of trouble if he was allowed to go on. Arvel looked over at Dick who understood
what he was thinking, and nodded in agreement.

“Deputy.” He waited to get the man’s attention
and knew, from his countenance, that they were in for a bad time. He had lost
color in his face and had trouble forming his words. He looked at Arvel,
bewildered.

“Yeah, what is it?”

“I think we should send Tim Brown back to
town.”

The three of them watched the young man run
from one body to the next, his actions defying logic.  He tried to straighten
the corpses’ clothing, waving flies from open wounds. “That poor fellow won’t
be anything but a liability going forward.”

The deputy pondered Arvel’s words, then stood,
stupefied. He began pulling at pieces of debris, and uprighted a bucket that
lay on the ground at his feet. He removed his hat and began running his fingers
through his hair repeatedly. He was trembling. “Well, I guess we’d better bury
these folks and get that fire put out. I guess we’d better…” he began muttering
incomprehensively. 

Dick Welles intervened: “Deputy, why don’t we get
these boys mounted up and follow up on the bandits? The fire will cause no
further damage, and the undertaker’s already been alerted. He’ll be along
shortly to take care of these poor souls. There’s nothing more we can do for
them. But we really must take up the trail and get those black devils before
they go and do any more harm.”

“The trail is cold.” The deputy spoke
automatically, without emotion. “They could be anywhere by now.” He rocked from
foot to foot, fingering the brim of his hat.

“No, sir!” Dick replied. He’d seen men act like
this in the war. They’d lose composure and direction.  Giving them a task is
the only way to get them out of it. “They went off due west,” he motioned with
a sweeping gesture of his hand, “and the only place for them to go is Potts
Springs. They must take water there before heading into the desert.  That’s
where we’ll find them. It’s not more than fifteen miles away. If they’ve moved
on already, we can track ‘em down and take them in the desert.”

This brought the young deputy to his senses,
more or less. He soon came around, more assertive and annoying than before.

“All right, you men, mount up.” He looked down
at Tim Brown, still fiddling with the headless woman. In a flash of clarity he
instructed the man to stay at the homestead until the undertaker arrived. The
young man did not hear him.

The bandits rode, just as Dick had surmised, to
Potts Springs. They were well provisioned with spirits to celebrate their deeds
and settled into the low mesa to take on a good drunk. They drank all night.
Several of them wore the Knudsen’s clothing. One Mexican was wearing Mrs.
Knudsen’s wedding dress. They lay nearly where they had fallen over in the
early hours of the morning and were sleeping off a good drunk.

Potts Springs was the only logical place for
them to go, if traveling west from the attack site. The reassuring thing about
bad men is that they are almost universally stupid and this band was no
different. It was easy enough to anticipate what they would do next.

The posse rode hard, too hard for Arvel and
Dick’s comfort, toward the bandit’s camp. They knew that a brash attack would
result in either an unnecessary loss of life or at least injury to members of
the posse, and now they were down a man and outnumbered twelve to ten as the
reporter could not be counted as a useful man. The two veterans knew well
enough that it was always more dangerous to attack a position than it was to
defend it.

Dick rode up next to the young deputy, trying
to convince him to stop but the addled youth refused to listen and ran the
posse to within a quarter mile of the spring. The dust cloud created by eleven
men galloping hard would be a dead giveaway and was apt to give the gang time
to prepare a defense.

The white man riding with the bandits was the
first to stir. He had drunk hardily but was unable to sleep. The horrific
images of the previous day’s attack would not leave his mind. He was a pathetic
man of twenty with bad teeth. He was known as Hedor for his mouth emitted a
stench out to a distance of several feet. No one particularly liked him. He was
merely tolerated. Like a rat, he seemed to be able to sense trouble before it
happened and was therefore some use to the bad men. He had stumbled upon the
bandit gang in late winter and, as he had no money and no cartridges for his
rifle, his prospects were limited. He joined up as a temporary measure and
hoped to drop out of their company when he got near enough to Tombstone where
his fortunes would likely improve.

He stood on a high rock, relieving himself
while scanning the horizon. He saw the dust and raised the alarm. Mexican and
Indian bandits slowly roused from their drunken sleep but most were too hung
over to move as quickly as they should. The bandit with the wedding dress cut
it off himself with his big knife; he stood in his underwear, looking about for
his gun belt and rifle.

Arvel saw the man on the rock. “Well, there’ll
be no surprising them now.” He pointed, “There’s one of them, right there, and
he’s raised the alarm.” Arvel pulled out his Henry rifle and fired at the man,
who dropped down instinctively, rat-like. The bullet parted his hair and
started a stream of blood into his eyes, but he was otherwise unharmed.

The young deputy screamed at the posse. “No
goddamned shooting until I give the command. We’ll never catch the sons-of-bitches
unawares now!” He glared at Arvel, then at Dick.

He stopped the troop momentarily and looked
through his field glasses. Everyone waited for him to tell them what to do. The
deputy looked bewildered. “Damn, I knew we shouldn’t have stopped.” He looked
accusingly at Dick. “Come on, you men, let’s ride.” The deputy did take the
lead, which impressed Dick Welles, even though he knew well enough that it was
more likely due to the heat of the moment than pluck and courage.

The posse bolted forward to within a hundred
yards of the gang and the shooting began. Arvel stood up in the saddle, placing
the butt of his rifle on his right foot, and pulled the magazine spring up,
working on replacing the cartridge he had fired as Sally galloped ahead, Donny
in tow.

Dick looked over at him and laughed. “Jesus,
Arvel, you look like a one-armed paperhanger trying to load that damned old
rifle.”

Arvel grinned. “You don’t worry about me; just
keep an eye on that deputy. You might learn a thing or two from him before this
day is over.” He got the cartridge replaced as Sally galloped on. He did not
need to coax her. Sally knew what Arvel wanted, often before he knew himself.

The bandits’ shots were high and wide and had
no effect on the posse. They continued forward until they found themselves in
an arroyo. They stopped there and dismounted. Bullets flew over their heads,
buzzing past them. It was a sound Arvel remembered too well and one he had
hoped he would not have to hear again in his lifetime. The deputy stood,
fidgeting with his reins as the men took up shooting positions. The reporter curled
into a ball, yanking his derby down over his eyes. He was acting more out of
prudence than fear.