The Loner: Dead Man’s Gold (14 page)

“You’ll get used to it,” Fortunato said around the cigar. He struck a match and held the flame to the end of the tightly packed cylinder of tobacco. “Besides, it can’t be any worse than dealing with an enraged prostitute, now can it?”

As far as the terrain went, the next two days were more of the same for The Kid, Dr. Annabelle Dare, and Father Jardine. The land was flat, sandy, and hot. Vegetation was sparse, although the stubborn mesquite trees still dotted the scenery. Those trees were no taller than shrubs and their branches were gnarled like the arms and legs of little old men. The dried bean pods that hung from their branches made a clicking sound whenever one of the blistering, vagrant breezes blew them together. Clumps of grass still grew here and there, enough to provide some graze for the horses. Occasionally, dry washes twisted across the landscape, with no sign of any water having run through them in months, if not years.

“It must have been a dry spring and summer,” Annabelle commented when they passed one of the parched arroyos. “That doesn’t bode well for the possibility of Laguna del Muerto having any water in it.”

“We have enough water in the barrels,” The Kid told her. They had been very careful so far, rationing out the precious, life-giving liquid. “We can make it to this Fra Cristobal place you told me about.”

“Even with the side trip into the lava field?”

The Kid nodded. “We’ll be all right…as long as nothing happens to those barrels.”

The main difference during this stretch of the journey was that no one attacked them. The Kid didn’t know if that last Apache was still trailing them, or even if the warrior was still alive, but it was possible. It seemed likely that Fortunato was still back there somewhere, too. Annabelle and Father Jardine were convinced that the Italian wouldn’t give up. By now he’d had time to recruit more hired gun-wolves. The Kid and his two companions had a good lead, but the wagon could only go so fast. If Fortunato’s men came after them on horseback, as they probably would, they could cut into that lead fairly rapidly.

For that reason, he checked behind them frequently, scanning the endless desert with the field glasses. He was surprised to find that the longer he went without seeing any signs of pursuit, the more worried he became.

Annabelle noticed the frown on his face after one such occasion. As he turned the buckskin and started riding alongside the wagon once more, she asked, “What’s wrong? Did you see something back there?”

The Kid shook his head. “Nope.”

“But you look like something’s bothering you,” Annabelle said, sounding puzzled.

“It is.”

“I don’t understand. The fact that no one’s chasing us is a good thing, right?”

The Kid thought about it for a moment, then said, “You know how it feels before a storm, when the air’s so heavy you can’t get your breath and you know it’s going to start pouring down rain any minute…but it doesn’t do it?”

“I suppose so.”

“You want it to just go ahead and storm and get it over with,” The Kid said. “That’s how this feels to me. I get tired of just waiting for something to happen.”

“So you’d rather we were attacked?” Annabelle shook her head. “I’m sorry, Mr. Morgan, but I don’t agree. It would be fine with me if I never saw Count Eduardo Fortunato again, and the same goes for that other Apache you’ve been worrying about.”

The Kid knew she was right. More violence still seemed inevitable to him, however.

The waiting’s always the hardest part
, Frank had said to him once.
I learned that back during the war. Standing in some trees and looking out at a field, knowing there were Yankees in the trees on the other side and that they were waiting, too, and that when the orders came down the line we’d all walk out there into the open and try to kill each other…Those are the times that gnaw holes in a man’s soul, son
.

Like a lot of other things, Frank was right about that. But The Kid knew there was nothing he and Annabelle and Father Jardine could do except keep going.

They had finally drawn even with the Caballo Mountains, so when they looked due west, the rugged gray peaks loomed there. On the other side of those mountains lay the valley of the Rio Grande, a green, fertile strip in an otherwise dry and dusty land. Over here in the Jornada del Muerto, it might as well have been on the moon. That was how far away the river seemed from this wasteland. They wouldn’t see the river again until they were north of the malpais.

Mid-afternoon of the second day after leaving Paraje Perillo, Annabelle said, “We ought to reach Aleman soon. Definitely by nightfall.”

“The place where folks believed the old German died?”

She nodded as she wearily flicked the reins against the backs of the team. “That’s right. From what I was able to discover about the place, several people have tried to establish a homestead there. There are some trees, and that fooled them into thinking that there might be water. One man even dug a well, thinking that he’d start a ranch. He didn’t have any luck.”

“Dry hole?”

“Actually, no. A little water seeped in when he dug deep enough. But it was too alkaline to drink. He had even started to build a house there. He abandoned it before it was finished.”

“Too bad. He should have figured, though, that there’s a good reason this part of the country is so empty. It’s not fit for humans to live here.”

Father Jardine said, “God made this land, the same as He did all the other. There must have been a reason for it.”

“Well, when you figure it out, padre, you tell me,” The Kid said with a smile.

A short time after that, when The Kid reined in and turned the buckskin so that he could study their backtrail, he noticed an odd haze in the air on the southern horizon. He pulled the field glasses from his saddlebags and lifted them to his eyes. His jaw tightened as he peered through the lenses and saw a dust cloud rising from the desert.

The trouble that had been looming over them for the past two days? Well, it was back there, sure enough, The Kid thought.

And it was on its way.

Fast.

Annabelle had kept the wagon moving while he stopped to check behind them, as usual. The Kid studied the dust through the field glasses for a few seconds longer, then shoved the glasses back in the saddlebags and turned his mount hurriedly to the north once again. The wagon was about fifty yards ahead of him. It took only a moment to catch up.

Annabelle heard the buckskin’s hoofs drumming on the ground and sensed that something was wrong. She was hauling back on the reins and bringing the team to a halt when The Kid reached the wagon.

“Keep going!” he called to her, waving her ahead. “Don’t slow down!”

“What is it?” Annabelle cried as she did as he said and slashed at the horses’ rumps with the reins.

“Riders coming up from the south! Looks like quite a few of them!”

Father Jardine closed his eyes, and since he made the sign of the cross a moment later, The Kid figured he had just muttered a prayer.

“Could you tell who they are?” the priest asked.

The Kid shook his head. “No, they’re too far back for that. I can see their dust, that’s all.”

“Perhaps they’re not pursuing us,” Father Jardine suggested. Annabelle had the team moving even faster than usual and the rougher pace made the priest sway back and forth on the seat. “Perhaps they’re just fellow travelers—”

“You know better, Father!” she said. “It’s Fortunato’s men. It has to be! He may even be with them!”

“Dear Lord, let us hope not. From everything I know of him, the man’s a veritable devil!”

The Kid figured that was a pretty good description. During the journey, Father Jardine had spoken of other holy artifacts the Church had tried to recover, only to have Fortunato get his hands on them first. The man’s palazzo in Venice must be full of art, sculpture, and other objets d’art, both secular and religious, from all over the world.

And The Kid had seen firsthand that Fortunato wouldn’t stop at murder to get what he wanted. The bullet that had grazed Annabelle’s arm would have taken her head off if its trajectory had been a few degrees different.

Of course, the same was true where he was concerned, he realized, and for the first time, it occurred to him that Fortunato might have been aiming at
him
that day, rather than Annabelle.

It didn’t matter, The Kid told himself. Either way, the Italian was a dangerous son of a bitch.

He twisted in the saddle to look back. The haze in the air had sharpened until even with the naked eye it appeared to be a dust cloud. That meant the pursuers were closer, cutting into the wagon’s lead.

Veering the buckskin nearer to the wagon, The Kid called to Annabelle, “You said there’s an abandoned homestead at this Aleman place?”

“That’s what I’ve read. I don’t know it for a fact.”

“We’d better hope that there is,” The Kid said.

“Why?”

“Because I reckon we’re going to need a place to fort up.”

“Oh, my dear!” Arturo cried as he clutched at the saddle horn and bounced wildly on the horse’s back. “Oh, my dear Lord! Can’t we slow down, Excellency?”

“We’re already behind all the others,” Fortunato said. “I don’t like breathing their dust, either!”

As soon as they had spotted the wagon, he had ordered Novak and the other gunmen to go ahead. All of them except Green were a couple hundred yards ahead of Fortunato and Arturo, closing on the wagon. The oldest of the gunmen had held back, leading the pack horses and keeping track of the spare saddle mounts, all of which were tethered together. And even
they
were ahead of Fortunato and Arturo.

If Novak and the others had captured the three people with the vehicle by the time Fortunato and his servant caught up, that would be all right with the count. He had no particular desire to engage in battle personally. He paid others to run those risks.

Over the past day and a half, as the group traveled north through the Jornada del Muerto, Fortunato had discussed the job with Novak, making it clear to the leader of the gunmen that Dr. Dare and Father Jardine were not to be killed when they overhauled the wagon. Fortunato didn’t want those two even harmed, if at all possible.

As for the young stranger who had interfered with the count’s previous attempt to close his hand around his quarry, Fortunato felt a certain amount of curiosity about him; that was undeniable. He would like to know who the stranger was and why he had involved himself in affairs that were none of his concern, as far as Fortunato could see.

For that reason, he preferred that the young man be taken alive, but as he had told Novak, that wasn’t absolutely necessary. If the stranger was killed in the fighting, Fortunato could always persuade Dr. Dare or Father Jardine to reveal who he’d been.

But only
after
they had been persuaded to tell him how to find the Konigsberg Candlestick and the secret of the Twelve Pearls, of course. It was a matter of priorities, and Fortunato was a man who always had his own priorities in their proper order.

“Oh, my!” Arturo yelped again. “Oh, my!”

The servant had complained almost unceasingly since they’d left Las Cruces. Count Fortunato was a man who craved his creature comforts, but the same was true of Arturo. He didn’t like the dust, he didn’t like the heat, and he didn’t like the hat with the huge brim that he wore to keep the sun off his head. The hat had a ribbon that tied under Arturo’s chin to keep it on. It looked ridiculous, Arturo said, but he liked the sun blistering his head even less.

The only reason he hadn’t complained too much about the food was that he had taken over preparing it himself, not trusting any of the hired gunmen to do an acceptable job. He claimed that dust got into the supplies, so that everything he cooked tasted like sand, no matter hard he tried to keep it out.

The worst thing, was the result of the seemingly endless hours in the saddle. That didn’t bother Fortunato—well, not much, anyway—but by the end of the first day, Arturo’s nether regions had been so sore that he could barely hobble around. They were even worse the next morning, when the muscles had had time to stiffen up.

But for all the complaining, Arturo had never fallen behind. He was still right there beside his master, doing his best to keep up and perform his duties. That was one reason Fortunato tolerated Arturo’s sarcasm and arrogance. For all his bad qualities, Arturo was still an excellent servant.

Fortunato looked at him as they galloped over the desert and asked, “Do you have your gun?”

“My gun? Surely you don’t expect me to
shoot
anyone, Excellency?”

“You won’t have to, if Novak and his men do their job. But just in case…”

“Yes, I have it,” Arturo said. “It’s even loaded, as you ordered. But, Excellency, really, I…I don’t think I’d be a very good shot.”

“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” Fortunato said.

They would know soon, because he had just heard the rapid popping of gunfire coming from up ahead.

Over the past week, The Kid had been careful to make sure they stopped the wagon often and allowed the team to rest. Annabelle had assured him that she had followed the same policy before he joined forces with them.

So the horses were in good shape, or at least as good a shape as they could be in, considering the heat and the poor graze and the distance they had covered.

But the best wagon team in the world couldn’t outrun men on horseback for very long.

The Kid knew that. That was why he hoped they could reach the old homestead at Aleman before their pursuers caught up with them. If they were caught out in the open, they wouldn’t have much chance of fighting off the attack.

He angled the buckskin closer to the galloping horses and took off his hat. He used the Stetson to swat the nearest member of the team on the rump and yelled, “Hyaaah! Hyaaah!” All the horses surged ahead a little faster.

The Kid twisted in the saddle to look back again. The dust cloud was visibly closer. He could make out dark specks at the base of it that were the riders whose mounts were kicking up all that dust.

But when he glanced ahead again, he saw a green blur on the horizon in the distance. Annabelle had mentioned that there were trees growing at Aleman. That might be it, he thought. He hoped so, and hoped as well that some of the walls of that old homestead were still standing.

Leaning forward in the saddle, he urged the buckskin on. His eyes were fixed on the clump of green, which grew steadily nearer. The Kid tried to keep his attention focused on that goal, but every minute or so, he couldn’t resist the impulse to glance back.

Every time he did, the pursuit was closer.

The wagon swayed wildly as Annabelle kept the team moving at top speed. The effect of every little bump or rut was magnified. A new worry began to gnaw at The Kid’s brain. If the wagon turned over, it was highly likely those water barrels lashed to its sides would burst open. That would be a catastrophe and would almost certainly doom them to a slow, lingering death by thirst.

But allowing their pursuers to catch up to them might be just as dangerous, he thought. Fortunato might keep them alive for a while, but The Kid had a feeling that if the Italian count got his hands on what he wanted, he wouldn’t leave any witnesses behind to tell the story.

It was a calculated risk either way. The Kid didn’t tell Annabelle to slow down. If Father Jardine knew any special prayers, he needed to be saying them. The horses pulling the wagon had about five minutes, maybe less, left in them at that speed.

Within a minute, The Kid began to make out individual trees. They were cottonwoods, which usually indicated the presence of water. He could understand why that would-be rancher had thought this might be a good place for a homestead. If it had worked out, the hombre would have had hundreds of square miles to himself. Nobody else wanted the range out there—and, as it turned out, for good reason.

He spotted some ruins among the trees and called to Annabelle, “There! Head for those walls! Find the best cover you can!”

“What are you going to do?” she shouted back at them.

The Kid pulled his Winchester from the saddle boot. “Try to discourage those varmints!”

“You can’t just start shooting at them!” Father Jardine cried. “You don’t know that they mean us any harm!”

The Kid was about to reply that he thought chasing them was indication enough that the riders weren’t their friends, but he didn’t have to say even that much. He heard the faint popping of gunfire over the pounding of the horses’ hooves.

“They’re shooting at us, padre!” he shouted. “That’s plenty reason for me!”

He hauled on the reins and wheeled the buckskin around in a wide circle as the wagon raced toward the ruins at Aleman. As the horse came to a stop under him, The Kid lifted the rifle to his shoulder and began cranking off rounds toward the onrushing horsebackers as fast as he could work the weapon’s lever. He wasn’t trying for accuracy, since the riders were still several hundred yards away, and he didn’t even care if he hit any of them—although a lucky shot or two that knocked a couple of them out of the saddle would be welcome. He was just trying to get their attention and maybe slow them down a mite.

More shots came from the pursuers, but they fell short, kicking up dust about fifty yards in front of The Kid. He supposed his bullets were landing short of the attackers, too. He raised the barrel of his rifle several inches and fired again.

The adjustment was rewarded by the sight of one of the riders suddenly leaning far back in his saddle, then toppling off. The Kid knew his shot had scored a hit. It was ninety-nine percent luck, of course, but he would take it.

The puffs of dust from the pursuers’ slugs hitting the ground were getting closer. The Kid whirled the buckskin and dug his boot heels into the horse’s flanks. The buckskin leaped into a gallop again as The Kid pounded after the wagon. Bullets fired by the riders continued to seek him, but he outran all of them.

Dust swirled up from the wagon wheels as Annabelle sent the vehicle racing behind the walls of the old homestead. Those walls had crumbled in places, although they were largely intact. There was no roof on the building, nor any doors or windows in the openings. The Kid supposed the rancher hadn’t gotten that far in his construction project. The walls were made of adobe and appeared to be pretty thick. The Kid was glad to see that. A thick adobe wall would stop a bullet every time.

By the time he rode around the old house, Annabelle and Father Jardine had climbed down from the wagon seat. The Kid swung out of the saddle while the buckskin was still skidding to a halt. He waved toward the ruins and called, “Get inside! Stay low!”

Father Jardine hurried into the building, but Annabelle ran to the back of the wagon and reached over the tailgate. The Kid was about to yell at her again to get behind some cover, but then she brought her hand out of the wagon with a rifle in it. She obviously intended to do her part in mounting a defense, and considering the way she had fought when those Apaches attacked them, The Kid wasn’t surprised.

“Find a window,” he told her as they both ducked through an empty door into the ruins. “We can hold them off from in here.”

Father Jardine stood with his back against a wall between two windows. His eyes were closed and his lips were moving. The Kid hoped the priest could do enough praying for all three of them, because he figured he and Annabelle would be a mite busy shooting for a while.

He knelt at one of the windows and poked the Winchester’s barrel over the sill. The riders were still charging toward the ruins.

“Let ’em have it!” he told Annabelle.

The whipcrack reports of rifle shots echoed from the old walls as The Kid and Annabelle both opened fire. The Kid’s Winchester clicked on an empty chamber after four rounds. He reached in his pocket, dug out a handful of fresh cartridges, and began thumbing them through the loading gate. He filled the magazine, then began firing again.

The riders spread out and began to turn back. The Kid couldn’t tell if he and Annabelle had downed any more of them. It was hard to tell because of the dust, but he thought there were about half a dozen men out there. Those weren’t terrible odds, considering that he and his companions had a fairly strong defensive position.

Then a potentially fatal weakness occurred to him, and he bit back a curse as he turned away from the window.

“Kid, what is it?” Annabelle called.

“I have to do something with the wagon and the team,” he said. “We can’t let those bastards get at them.”

“The water!” Annabelle said in a voice choked with horror. “If they shot the water barrels—”

The Kid didn’t hear the rest of it. He ran out the door on the other side of the ruins, where they had left the wagon and the team.

There was another old building about fifty yards away that had crumbled even more. It must have been intended to be the barn, he thought, because the opening in the front of it was wide enough for two big doors. More importantly, it was wide enough for the wagon to fit through it.

The Kid turned and called over his shoulder to Annabelle, “There’s an old barn over there! I’m going to put the wagon in it. Come on while we’ve got the chance!”

The riders had pulled back to regroup and figure out what they were going to do next, but The Kid knew it wouldn’t be long before they attacked again. He grabbed the harness of one of the lead horses and tugged the animal toward the old, abandoned barn. The rest of the team followed.

The Kid heard a couple of shots behind him as he led the horses toward the barn. Then Annabelle and Father Jardine ran out of the house and hurried after the wagon.

“I gave them a couple shots to keep them thinking,” Annabelle said. “That might delay them a few more seconds.”

“We can use all the seconds we can get,” The Kid agreed.

They were about halfway to the barn when Father Jardine cried, “Here they come again!”

The Kid heard the shots but kept his attention focused on the job at hand, which was getting the wagon—and those precious water barrels—safely behind some thick walls.

“Go ahead!” he called to his companions. “Get inside the barn!”

“You go, Father,” Annabelle said. “I’ll hold them off.”

She turned, lifted the rifle to her shoulder, and began firing again. The Kid didn’t hold the curse back this time as he looked over his shoulder and saw what she was doing. Standing out there in the open like that, she was a perfect target.

For some reason, no shots came anywhere near her. The Kid expected slugs to kick up dust around her feet, but it didn’t happen. It was almost like the pursuers were deliberately trying not to shoot her.

As soon as that thought went through his head, The Kid knew it was true. He knew, as well, that those gunmen worked for Count Eduardo Fortunato. The count wanted Annabelle alive, because she knew where to look for the Konigsberg Candlestick and the secret of the Twelve Pearls. The same probably held true for Father Jardine.

He was the only one who was truly expendable, The Kid thought with a grim smile as he led the horses through the opening where the barn’s double doors should have been. He whistled for the buckskin to follow them into the barn.

One wall was still mostly intact. The Kid led the team over to it. That would give the wagon the most protection possible in those ruins. He left it there and ran back to the entrance, where Father Jardine waited.

“Go get under the wagon and stay there, Father,” The Kid said. “Unless you want to grab a gun and join the fight.”

“You know I can’t do that, Mr. Morgan.”

“Then stay out of the way,” The Kid said. He didn’t mean to be rude about it, but he wasn’t going to waste any time trying to spare the priest’s feelings.

He looked out and saw Annabelle backing toward the barn, still firing the rifle as she retreated. The riders dashed toward the old house where The Kid and his companions had first taken shelter. Annabelle tried to keep them from reaching the cover, but they galloped behind the ruins too fast for her to stop them.

“Come on!” The Kid called. “Get in here, Doctor!”

Annabelle turned and ran toward the barn entrance. At the same time, shots blasted from the corner of the house as some of the enemy threw lead at The Kid as he stood there. He ducked back as dust and chips of adobe flew into the air where the slugs smacked into the wall beside his head.

Then Annabelle let out a sharp cry and fell, sprawling facedown on the ground ten yards short of the barn.