Snake Eyes (9781101552469) (13 page)

“Are you sure about this man?” Joe asked.

“I'm sure,” Brad said. “And, speaking of that, who is that Mexican chopping wood for you?”

“He came and asked for work. I have lost two men. I put him to work,” Mike said.

“Where did he come from?” Brad asked.

“Fort Collins, I think.”

“Well, keep your eye on him. He could be a spy for Snake.”

The expression on Mike's face changed. Joe frowned.

“Maybe,” Joe said. “But why? Snake knows we are here. He knows we have many sheep. Why would he send a man to spy on us?”

“I don't know,” Brad said. “And that's what worries me.”

He decided that he would find out more about the Mexican that night when everyone was drinking and eating and dancing. He would talk to the man and see if his answers were honest and trustworthy. After all, he told himself, he was a detective and it was his job to gather information, to detect. He might as well earn all of his pay as long as he carried a badge.

That night the revelry started.

There was no sign of the Mexican, and Brad did not even know his name.

But he now knew one thing. The man was a spy, and Snake had sent him.

Tomorrow, Brad said to himself, he would ask Sorenson about him.

For now, he could enjoy himself dancing with Leda and the other ladies before their departure in the morning.

It was a happy evening, though tinged with a deep sadness, too.

In the shadows, beyond the blazing fire, the lanterns, the guitars, and the wagon sheets, there hovered the shades of the two dead men, the one who had been beheaded and the one who had been hanged.

Brad felt the chill, but it was not entirely from the night air and the breeze that blew down from the high peaks.

It was the chill of death and the darkness of the road ahead where danger lurked and men plotted and planned murder most foul.

Jorge Verdugo rode in to the Schneck camp late that night, put up the mule, and knocked on the door of Schneck's cabin. He was tired and wanted to get his report over with and get back to his regular work so that he could forget about the Basques. He had watched them dance to the fiddles and guitars and had stolen quietly away, wishing he could have stayed on with those happy people.

“Who is it?” Schneck's gruff voice boomed through the wooden door.

“Verdugo.”

“I'll get the latch,” Schneck said.

A moment later, Verdugo heard Schneck lift the latch, and the door swung open on leather hinges.

He stepped into the dark room, heard Schneck pad away from him in his stockinged feet. Verdugo heard the tink of the glass chimney, then the scratch of the
fosforo
as the German stuck the match and touched the flame to the wick.

“Back so soon?” Schneck said as he waved Verdugo to a chair and sat down on the edge of a small, rough-hewn table.

“The women and children are going away in the morning,” Verdugo said.

“Going away? Where?”

“To some place on the Poudre river.”

“All of them?”

“I think so. Yes. They packed their clothes and put them in a wagon with blankets and tents. Many hundreds of sheep came there today. They fill the valley. Many sheep. Maybe one or two thousand. So many they do not have room in that little valley.”

“Damn,” Schneck said. He walked over to a nail where his pants were hanging. He patted the pockets and then pulled out a gold watch on a chain. He carried it over to the lamp and looked at the time.

“Midnight,” he said.

“Will you pay me the twenty dollars, Otto?”

“Yes, yes, but not now. Tomorrow. I want you to wake up Jim Wagner, tell him to get his ass over here quick. Then find Sweeney and Jackson. Tell them to get dressed and ready to ride.”

“Yes. I will do that,” Verdugo said. He felt an onset of nerves as if he were doing something illegal. He was not a nervous man, but he knew something was wrong for Schneck to send him to wake up the foreman and two other men.

“Then, saddle all our horses. Have them ready, Jorge, in twenty minutes. Can you do that?”

“Four horses, no.”

“Get some help. Make sure those saddles are cinched up tight.”

“I try,” Verdugo said.

“Do it.”

There was no sympathy or understanding in Schneck's expression. His neck was bulged out like a bull's, and he was already pulling on his pants and reaching for a shirt.

Verdugo left before Schneck could give him any more orders. He ran to the cabin where he knew Wagner bunked with several other men. He felt sweat drip from his armpits and lave his face.

Wagner was grouchy when Verdugo shook him awake and grumbled until he told him Schneck had ordered him to saddle four horses.

“You'll find Ned and Percy bunking in the second hut to the left of this one. Get them to help you saddle the horses,” Wagner said. “Did Snake say what he wanted?”

“No,” Verdugo said. “He just wants the horses saddled quick.”

“Shit,” Wagner said as he pulled on his boots. He stood up and took his gun belt off a nail on the wall as Verdugo left the dark cabin and raced to where Percy Wibble and Ned Kingman slept. Wagner grabbed his rifle from where it stood in a corner and hefted his saddlebags, slung them over his shoulder.

Wibble and Kingman were difficult to wake up. They cursed Verdugo and swung at him from their bedrolls. When he told them that they had to saddle horses for Wagner and Schneck, they got up, rubbed rough granules from their eyes, and swore the entire time they dressed. They stumbled out into the darkness and trotted to the stables. Cattle groaned and grunted and the moon glistened on their spines like quicksilver, splattered their amoebic shadows as they moved and grazed on the short grass.

Verdugo knew where Sweeney and Jackson were and roused them from sleep with a jabbing finger to their chests. They were both hopping mad until he told them that Schneck was on the warpath and he needed them to ride with him.

LouDon Jackson belched and his breath was sour beans and onions that splashed against Verdugo's face and made his stomach twist and roil with bile.

“Why in hell does Schneck want us to ride with him?” Jackson muttered as he donned his jacket.

“Hell, you ought to be damned glad he did, LouDon,” Sweeney said. “It means that he still trusts us and we ain't in trouble even if it's after midnight and colder'n a well digger's ass outside.”

“Halbert, I don't need you answerin' all my questions,” Jackson said.

“Well, you asked.”

“I was just askin'. I wasn't talkin' to nobody.”

“Maybe Snake don't trust us no more,” Sweeney said.

“Why not?”

“Because we . . . oh, hell, I don't know. Maybe it has somethin' to do with that stranger who shot Grunewald.”

“Hell, that's old business, Halbert,” Jackson said. He plunked on his hat and went outside. He saw that Verdugo was running toward the stables as if his life depended on it.

Sweeney followed a few seconds later, running to catch up. Both men shivered in the sudden chill as freshets of a light wind poured into the valley from the snow-flocked mountain range glistening in the moonlight like some towering fortress with whitewashed ramparts.

Schneck looked at the men assembled in his hut. He wore his six-gun and held his rifle across his lap as he sat on the table.

“What's up, Otto?” Wagner asked.

“I'll tell you what's up, Jim. All of you. Those damned sheepherders have run in a couple thousand sheep and they got to find more graze. Graze that belongs to us, by God, when my main herd gets here day after tomorrow.”

“Maybe tomorrow,” Wagner said. “It's after midnight.”

“I know what time it is, Jim. Just shut up and listen. We don't have a hell of a lot of time.”

“Where we goin'?” asked Sweeney, unmindful of Schneck's command, apparently.

“We're going to the Poudre,” Schneck said. “We're going to ride down it and hide in the aspens and pines until those foreigners come down it with their wagons and shit, and then we're going to blow them all straight to hell.”

“Huh?” Jackson husked.

“You heard me. Gun work. Bring plenty of bullets for both your rifles and your pistols. That damned Garaboxosa didn't listen to me, so now I'm going to teach him a lesson. A hard lesson.”

“I take it we ain't killin' no sheepherders, Otto,” Wagner said.

“You're pretty canny, Jim,” Schneck said. “No, we ain't killin' sheepherders this damned day. We killed two already and that Basque bastard didn't get the message.”

“Who are we killin' exactly?” Sweeney asked.

Schneck shot him a look that was full of daggers.

“His women and kids, that's who,” Schneck said.

Jackson swore under his breath. Sweeney looked as if he had been kicked squarely in the balls. He tightened up all over as though someone had pulled a string in his backbone.

“Christ, Otto,” Wagner said. “That's a big step. Women and kids.”

“It's the only way I can get Garaboxosa's attention, Jim. He won't listen to reason. If he runs his sheep on that pasture land we need, we'll have to hunt all over the Rocky Mountains for enough graze to last the summer. We'll lose time and we'll lose money, and our cattle won't get fat.”

“You have a point, Otto,” Jim said. “I just wish . . .”

“If we kill all his men, Garaboxosa can hire more. He can't get his women and kids back. It's the only way. Now, let's mount up and make sure you all got plenty of cartridges.”

“How many people are we talking about, Boss?” Jackson asked.

“I didn't get a tally, but a dozen or so, maybe.”

“Should be easy pickin's,” Sweeney said. “At least them womenfolk won't be shootin' back.”

“Don't be so damned sure, Halbert,” Schneck said. “Those Basque women are tough as hickory. Just pick your targets and don't leave any witnesses alive.”

“All right,” Sweeney said, that string up his spine loosening a little.

“All right,” Schneck said, “let's go. It's a long ride down there and we need to find a good spot before they come down the mountain.”

The four men left the cabin and walked to the stables.

Verdugo, Wibble, and Kingman were waiting outside with the four horses all saddled and pawing the ground. Moonlight pewtered their faces and bodies so that they looked ghostly.

“You don't need us to go with you, Boss?” Kingman asked.

“No, not this time. But come dawn, you be on your guard. No telling what those Basques will do when we teach them a lesson.”

“Otto,” Verdugo said, “I did not tell you before, but I saw that gringo, the one they call ‘Sidewinder.' ”

“Yeah?” Schneck said.

“He is a detective, and he is the one who killed Rudy.”

Schneck wiped a hand across his mouth.

“Sidewinder, huh? Well, we'll see how he stands up to a Snake.”

“Yes, sir,” Verdugo said.

“Keep an eye out, boys,” Schneck said as he dug his rowels into his horse's flanks. The men rode off across the valley, four abreast.

Verdugo watched them go and he shuddered inside.

He knew where they were going and what they were going to do, even though Schneck had not told him.

He felt sorry for those poor women and children who would die. He wished there was something he could do. But he could not stand up to a man like Schneck. Nobody could. He was too strong, too tough, and too lean. He was
muy macho
. Men like Schneck did not back down. When they wanted something, they got it, and Verdugo knew that Schneck would show no mercy.

He crossed himself. Tomorrow, when he awoke, he would pray silently for the souls of those women and children he had seen laughing, playing, and singing as if none of them had a care in the world.

Tomorrow. Today.

As he mucked out the stable, Verdugo wept. The tears streamed down his face and he did not wipe them away.

Off in the distance, a wolf howled, and it was the loneliest sound he had ever heard.