Houston Attack (6 page)

The man's eyes were glazed and slightly crossed from the beating he had just taken. “Back room,” he whispered. His head motioned beyond the bar.

“Is he alone?”

The man hesitated just long enough for Hawker to know it was a lie. “Yes,” he said. “Hernando is alone, yes.”

As Hawker stood, the black man made a quick motion toward the Thompson, which lay just out of his reach. Hawker swung the Ingram toward his face. “Go ahead,” he whispered. “If you're really feeling lucky.” He kicked the Thompson toward him.

The man shook his head quickly, as if he were being wrongly accused. But the moment Hawker turned his back, he heard the quick scrape of metal. Hawker whirled and squeezed off two quick shots.

The black man's head exploded, and the Thompson was thrown against the wall as his arms convulsed upward.

“Bad choice,” Hawker whispered.

Most of the lights in the bar had been switched off. The place stank of cigarette smoke and stale beer. Hawker noticed that the table on the stage had not been removed.

Hawker knew that the mirror behind the bar was a two-way mirror. He pretended to ignore it.

He walked softly, carefully, his ears tuned for any noise.

From some unknown source there came a muted, metallic
click
.

The sound registered immediately: It was the noise of a shotgun being snapped closed.

Hawker dropped instantly to his belly. As he did there was a deafening roar, and the mirror jumped outward, away from the bar. Glass rained down on Hawker.

On his knees, he crawled quickly to the end of the bar and popped up, the Ingram vectoring. A head materialized behind the row of liquor bottles where the mirror had once been. For a microsecond Hawker had the strange impression he was at a shooting gallery.

He squeezed off a shattering burst of fire. The 9mm slugs tore through the man in the next room, spinning him around. In the same instant another man jumped up, and an automatic pistol threw a flame toward Hawker's head. There was a sudden vacuum of air near Hawker's ear, which told him the slug had narrowly missed him.

The man never got the chance to try a second time. Hawker held the Ingram on steady burst, and the man was thrown into oblivion, his face drenched with gore.

Hawker swung around the bar and hesitated by the door, listening. He sensed more than heard that someone stood just beyond, waiting for him. Holding the submachine gun at hip level, the vigilante shot through the door, then kicked the door open. As he entered, the heavy shadow of the fat bartender disappeared down the hall. Hawker turned the Ingram to squeeze off a quick shot—but the weapon clicked empty.

Hawker cursed himself softly for not carrying more ammunition. But he had come expecting trouble—not a war.

Quickly he bent over one of the corpses. It was the man with the little automatic pistol. A Walther PPK with a stainless body.

Not a cheap weapon.

Hanker wondered who was financing them.

As he tried to pry it from the dead man's hands, a deep voice laughed. “So the one-armed gringo is really a two-armed cop?” The laughter thickened. “And now he is out of bullets. And now he is going to die.”

Hawker turned to see the fat bartender, Hernando, his greasy hair like a towel over his shoulders. He was holding a Winchester 97 12-gauge pump gun leveled at Hawker's face.

The bartender walked toward him, stopping so the barrel of the Winchester was just out of Hawker's reach. “You have killed many men tonight, gringo. Many of my best men. You have caused me great inconvenience. Our Mexican police are not as fussy about details as you Americano cops—but even so, it will not be easy explaining so many dead bodies to them.”

Hawker stood easily on the balls of his feet. He took two slow steps backward, hoping it would bring the fat bartender closer to him.

It did.

“Kill me if you want to,” Hawker said easily. “But don't kill me as a cop. I'm down here because a friend of mine was murdered. A man named Jonathan Flischmann. Know anything about it?”

The Mexican's grin never left his face. “I know that he was a lawyer, and like all lawyers he asked too many questions. I know that he was a threat to my employer.” His grin broadened. “I did not know that he had been killed. But now that I know, I am glad.”

“Yeah,” said Hawker, taking another step backward. “I guess he found out about your rich Texan boss, huh? About how he uses this bar as a front for a slave ring. Right now some other friends of mine are following that slave truck of yours into Texas. And when it gets to its destination, everyone involved is going to be arrested.”

Hernando gave a noncommittal shrug. “Is that so? Then I am surprised you did not run when you had the chance.”

As the bartender took another half-step toward him, Hawker faked an arcing overhand right at the Mexican's face, then dropped to his knees as the shotgun gouged a hole in the wall behind him. As he dropped, Hawker's hand disappeared beneath his serape, and then he was driving upward; upward with all his strength, driving the seven-and-a-half-inch blade of his Randall Attack/Survival knife deep into the fat Mexican's groin.

The Randall Model 18, with its hand-sharpened carbon-steel body and saw-toothed upper blade slid through the flesh and gristle, then ripped its way out when Hawker jerked away.

The Mexican screamed terribly, his legs slashing in agony. Hawker pounced on him immediately, holding the knife at his throat. “Tell me,” he yelled. “Tell me the name of your partner in Texas. Tell me, and I'll get you a doctor.”

The fat bartender gave Hawker a burning look of fear and desperation. “Sister … Sister Star Ranch. Will … Williams.
Oh, the pain!”

Hawker stood up quickly, his head swinging back and forth in search of a phone. He had promised the man a doctor—and he would try to get him one.

But he wouldn't stick around to help.

There was a side door off the back office, and Hawker opened it and switched on the light.

The woman who had appeared on stage earlier lay naked upon a bed. The blond wig she wore sat crookedly on her head. Her eyes sagged open for a moment, trying to focus on Hawker.

“Is it time?” she moaned. “Do I have to go back on already, Hernando? Give me a fix, or I won't be able to. Please, just one more, and I'll go, Hernando. I promise.”

There was a telephone on the desk beside the bed. Hawker studied it for a moment. Thinking suddenly about Cristoba de Abella, the beautiful Indian girl, Hawker looked at the pathetic woman on the bed. “How did you get here?” he asked. “Where are you from?”

The woman stared at him, incoherent. “Why,
you
brought me here, Hernando. Don't you remember? I was on vacation and I trusted you, and
you
brought me here.”

The woman settled back on the bed in what she thought was a suggestive pose. She rubbed her hands over the stretch-mark-scarred breasts and licked her lips. “If you make me a fix, I'll give you something nice in return, eh? Something real nice, okay?”

Feeling an involuntary nausea, Hawker switched out the light and closed the door behind him. Hernando, still writhing in agony, looked up at him expectantly.

Hawker picked up the empty Ingram and slung it over his shoulder. “Bad news, Hernando,” Hawker said as he headed toward the bar's front door. “You're going to have to make your own phone call—even if it means you'll never trust me again.”

seven

It took Hawker only a few hours to get back across the border.

He jettisoned all weaponry but the handmade Randall knife. He doubted if news of the mass killings had reached the border guards yet, but he wanted to take no chance of his weapons being found.

But once he got back into Texas, he could not afford to hurry. He needed more information. He needed specifics.

Twenty-four hours later, from a phone booth in Weslaco, he called Gasteau Blakely. Blakely was not pleased, to say the least.

“Jesus Christ, Hawker!” he yelled. “What went on down there in Mexico last night?”

“I have no idea what you're talking about, Gas,” Hawker answered calmly. “I spent a couple of days playing tourist. Bought a basket. People down there were real friendly. Quite a welcome I got at one bar in particular—”

“What about the welcome
you
gave, for God's sake! Shit, Hawker, I thought those rumors I'd heard about you had been exaggerated. Hell, you're a damn war machine—”

“Hang on, Gas. Like I said, I have no idea what you're talking about. But if this guy is all he's supposed to be, then you can bet the guys who got hit down there damn well deserved to get hit. But that's not why I'm calling. I'm calling because I need information. There's the name of a man I want you to check on, and the name of a ranch.…”

Finally Blakely calmed down enough to promise he would check out both for Hawker. But he finished with a warning. “Damn it, Hawker, I don't want that shit going on in my district. Do you hear me? If you go one step over the line in my district, I'm going to put your ass in jail and feed the key to the hogs.”

“Nice talking to you, too, Gas,” Hawker said, smiling. “And like I said: I don't know what in the hell you're talking about.”

So Hawker stuck to the back roads, bouncing along in the battered Chevy pickup truck. He stopped at desolate ranches, small towns, and two gas stations.

He talked with people. He ate and drank with them. He asked questions about the Bar of the Unknown Souls and about rumors of a slavery ring. Always the reaction was the same. These good, friendly people turned inward, uncommunicative. He was welcome as a man, but his questions were not wanted. The impression Hawker had of this organization was now doubly strong: It was a source of terror to all who had heard of it.

So Hawker would ask his questions and move on. Once again he was the one-armed drifter. Once again he was on the trail.

But now he had something to go on. The name of a ranch: The Sister Star. And the name of a man: Williams.

Every night he stopped at a ranch house and traded work for a place to sleep in the barn. And every night he drove to the nearest town and tried to call his second connection: Sancho Rigera. And always there was no answer, or he got a recording saying the phone was out of order.

Just when Hawker decided he should drive back to Sancho's ranch and make sure he and his family were all right, the little Mexican finally answered.

It had been nearly two weeks since they had talked, and Sancho seemed delighted to hear from him. “My friend and partner, it is so good of you to call. I was just telling the
esposa
that I feared the bad men had taken you.”

“And I was beginning to think the same about you, Sancho. I couldn't get you on the phone.”

“Hah! This telephone. This dirty machine!” Hawker heard him spit in contempt. “There is a devil inside this
teléfono
sent to vex me. It breaks. I ride twenty miles to contact the telephone company. But when the men arrive two days later to fix it, it is no longer broken. The men look at me as if I am crazy. And then, the moment they leave, it refuses to work once again. A curse on this instrument!”

Hawker laughed at the little man's anger. “I called because I need some information, Sancho. There's a ranch named—”

“I will help you in any way I can, my friend,” the little man cut in. “But first I have some things to discuss. Some matters of business,” he added importantly. “The documents of our corporation arrived three days ago. My neighbors, the silly men, found it impossible to believe that I was president of a company as important as Chicago Fossil Fuels Limited. Can you imagine their surprise when I showed them these documents? It was a moment of such importance that we toasted it with mescal. Whenever another neighbor arrived, we toasted it again. Soon there was a party.”

“Did the documents survive?” Hawker asked wryly.

“But of course. Juan Probisco, the nasty man, stained them with oil from his hands. I was very angry, James, but then Juan suggested that it might be a good thing—the stain of oil on the documents of a company that seeks oil.”

“Yes, indeed.” Hawker smiled. “A good omen.”

“It was a good omen for Juan, because I was about to smack him with a hammer.”

“Sancho,” Hawker pressed, “I need to ask you about a certain ranch—”

“Yes, but first the news!” the Mexican interrupted. “I was about to tell you: We have selected a spot to dig for oil!”

“Sancho, you don't understand. We didn't form that company to actually look for oil. We formed that company so that you and your neighbors wouldn't be harassed anymore.”

The hurt in Sancho's voice was plain. “But what is the use of being president of such a company if the company does not actually seek oil? At this party of which I spoke, all of my neighbors signed this fine document, James. We are all members now. And while it is true you are vice-president, I am still the
president
—”

“Okay, okay, Sancho, we'll look for oil,” Hawker said, chuckling. “And you've already picked the spot?”

“We have,” Sancho Rigera said with authority. “It was my friend Juan's idea. It was reasoned this way: If a man seeks gold in a river, what must he first do? He must first put a little gold in that river. Do you see? Gold attracts gold. It is Juan's understanding that it is the same with all things of value: silver, diamonds …
and oil.”

“It makes sense so far,” Hawker said agreeably. “Sure.”

“Does it not? That is why we have such high hopes. You see, it is this way. There is a spot near our village where the women dump their bad grease. Since I was a little boy, the women of the village have always used this spot. For a hundred years, maybe more, it has been this way. It is true that this spot is not such a nice place for the nose. But what in reality is old grease?”