Paxton and the Lone Star (24 page)

“Padre Salva has given her a bed in the infirmary behind the cathedral,” Jones said. “I have faith in him.”

“But of course, Señor Jones. I forget you are no stranger to San Antonio,” Cos purred. “Unfortunately, those you lead are strangers. It becomes my duty to press further. You have enlightened me as to the stages of your journey, but I remain woefully ignorant of where it is destined to end.”

“Here, General. These folks bear deeds to the land Señor Cirilio Medina, my employer, offered as grants and sold while he was up north. He hired me to bring them here, which I have done. As soon as I lead them to Señor Medina's
hacienda,
I will have earned the money he paid me.”

“Ahhhhh. Señor Cirilio Medina.” Cos sighed knowingly, rose, and walked away from his desk. The afternoon sunlight, streaming through the windows, glinted from the gold buttons and braid adorning his uniform. “Yes. A good man. And honest.”

“I have always found him so, General,” Jones said.

“Who? What?” True whispered.

“Shut up,” Jones snapped under his breath. Something was wrong and he didn't need distractions. “We've got problems.”

“What?”

“I don't know what yet. Shhh …”

His adjutant had anticipated the general's desire and opened the French doors. Cos strode through them onto the balcony overlooking the military plaza. Below him, to the obvious relief of the settlers—among whom he particularly noted a striking blond young woman standing next to what was probably the ugliest man he had ever seen—the wagons were being pulled out of a guarded compound. The first hint of the coming norther made Cos suck in his breath and feel profound gratitude for his woolen uniform. “Medina,” he said, reentering the room. “Good, honest, and fool enough to prefer the deposed Bustamente over our new and glorious leader, Major General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, President of Mexico.”

“Oh, shit!” Jones muttered in English.

True felt the flesh crawl on the back of his neck.

Cos sat in the thronelike chair. The wood creaked despite his slender build. “Times change,” he said matter of factly. “Titles change. Life is a river of unending progression, is it not?”

Jones's expression was one of humble perplexity. “The general will forgive me if I do not understand what this matter has to do with these innocent settlers who have entered Mexico in all good faith, and with no knowledge of either Bustamente or President Santa Anna.”

“Then I must make myself understood,” Cos said with a deceptively pleasant smile. “The unfortunate Medina is no longer with us. His place and his lands have been given by General Santa Anna to Major Luther O'Shannon in recognition of his most important services during the unpleasant demise of our late president.”

“What in the
hell
is he talking about?” True asked, beside himself.

The general suffered the upstart young
norteamericano
a withering glance. “As a result,” he went on coldly to Jones, “the matter must be discussed with Major O'Shannon. I will add, however, that the manner in which your party conducts itself during your visit to San Antonio de Bexar is and will be of extreme interest to me. You do understand that the preservation of peace and order in this province is my responsibility.”

“I can assure you, General Cos, that the folks I accompany are law-abiding people,” Jones said, his tone a little too pleasant for True's liking. “With respect for your person and your title, they are grateful for your assistance, and will indeed present themselves to Señor O'Shannon at their, and his, earliest convenience. And now, with your kind permission?…”

“Of course, Senor Jones. Good day.”

They were dismissed. Jones grabbed True by the arm and propelled the volatile younger man out the door before giving him a quick, rough translation of what had happened.

“They can't do this to us!” True exploded as they made their way downstairs.

“They haven't done anything yet,” the wagon train master replied. “First thing to learn here, boy, is to leave while the military is still neutral. All Cos was saying is that we need to ride out to see this O'Shannon fella. If there's anybody to get riled at it's ol' Cirilio. I know he hated Santy Anna's guts, but to cut his own throat in the process was a damn fool thing to do. Hell, I credited him with more sense than that.”

A blast of arctic wind struck them as they emerged from the ornate front doors of the Military Governor's Palace. The norther was hitting, sending dust flying. Local merchants whose stalls lined the plaza scurried to put away their goods and head home. Women of dusky beauty carrying armloads of homespun goods cried out to their children to help them. Men clad in the blousy garments of
péons
staggered under loads of winter vegetables. Children, all agog at the black man and the strangely light-complected
norteamericanos,
laughed and ran about underfoot. Usually listless soldiers hurriedly led mules and horses to shelter or ran for their barracks to get heavy winter cloaks.

“Well, it's here,” Jones yelled above the shrieking wind to the settlers who waited for him to guide them to a place where they could spend the night. “I'll tell you what's happening as soon as we get inside. Meanwhile, it's gonna get a lot colder, and fast. Follow me.”

The temperature plummeted sharply. Shortly after five, with the stock stabled and the exhausted settlers assigned rooms, everyone except the Thatches and Eustacia Matlan, who were still at the infirmary, gathered in the large main room of
La Casa del Rio
to hear Thaddeus Jones explain the changes that had taken place since his departure from San Antonio some four months earlier.

“It's gone,” a stunned Nels said.

“We don't know that for sure,” Jones pointed out, trying to ease the shock.

“We paid good money. All we had, mostly. And now you're saying the bastards stole it from us!” Scott Campbell's voice shook and his face was bloodless. At his side, Joan wept silently.

Jack Kemper rose and his fist slammed down on the table. No one looked at him, but they all shared his anger. “I'm not going to let it happen,” he said, his voice choked. “I say we ride out to this O'Shannon's place right now and find out what the hell's going on.”

“You're damned right!” Scott chimed in, warming to Kemper for the first time since they'd met. “Dennis, Mackenzie, you've been itching to use those guns. Well, now you can go get them.”

“Now wait just a minute—” Jones began.

“Wait, hell!” Scott roared.

“Sit down and let the man talk,” Hogjaw growled from the far end of the table.

“Who the hell's side are you on, anyway?” Kemper asked. “You're supposed to be looking out for those girls. Well, they're losing too, same as the rest of us. I say Campbell and I are right. We get our guns and
take
our land, if need be.”

Dennis and Mackenzie pushed back from the table. “Anyone else joining us?” Dennis asked, looking pointedly from Joseph to True.

Elizabeth clutched True's hand so hard her knuckles were white. Lottie clung to Joseph's arm. True didn't move. “I'm for listening to Jones,” he finally said. “He knows more about this than any of the rest of us. Joseph?”

Every head in the room swiveled to Joseph, who deferred to Hogjaw with a sullen nod. “I don't know who this O'Shannon is,” Hogjaw said, his voice a low rumble, “but I do know this much. If he's here with Santy Anna's blessin', you can bet he ain't here alone. He'll have men. Fightin' men and plenty of 'em. Goin' after him would be like goin' after an old grizz with nothin' but a butter knife, which only a damn fool would do.” No one dared interrupt him. “I fer one just spent fifty some years workin' hard at not bein' a damn fool. I ain't about to start now. And as fer land, I never yet met a dead man who gave a hoot about it one way or t'other.”

“'Nuff said?” Jones asked in the silence that followed. “Campbell? Kemper?”

Scott glared around the table, at last sighed in resignation, and waved his boys back to their seats. Jack Kemper, suddenly alone, followed reluctantly.

“Good,” the wagon train master went on. “Now, tomorrow mornin' is soon enough for anything. Ain't nothin' gonna change before then, so there's no sense in goin' off half-cocked, which means we'll want to keep calm and do some plannin'.”

There wasn't anything to plan, really. They did talk, though, and as Jones had hoped, they calmed down. Outside, night descended, the dark matching the settlers' moods. The howling wind stalked the streets and searched for crevices in the adobe. Numbing cold waited those who stepped outdoors. Slowly, the talk died. What should have been a joyous occasion for the newcomers had turned into one fraught with doubt and uncertainty. About the only thing good any of them could say about their arrival was that they were under a solid roof instead of camping out. Not even the Thatches found relief, for word had been sent from the infirmary that Mildred had not yet delivered. Isolated, nursing their fears, the original band sat around the main room of
La Casa
and stared at the walls and each other.

True, Joseph, and Hogjaw had fled the glum atmosphere. After all, they hadn't come to Texas to settle on land already bought. They had lost nothing but their option money, one hundred dollars. Their dreams had not been shattered. And yet, as they stood at the bar in a tiny
cantina
adjoining the lobby where a wizened, sour old man attended, a pall hung over them.

The
cantina
was well lit with coal oil lanterns. A half dozen Mexes, as Hogjaw called the native San Antonians, sat around a large round table and talked in low tones. A cracked mirror behind the bar doubled the shelves of cups, glasses, and variously labeled bottles of Scotch, rum, and whiskey. Hogjaw pointed to a clear bottle filled with a milky liquid and ordered for the three of them.

“If you don't mind,” Joseph snapped, “I'll order for myself. Rum.”

“The only thing that makes that stuff rum,” Hogjaw countered, “is the tobacco juice added to it. Pepper and wood ashes turn the same thing into Scotch. And that one labeled ‘Kantuky Sippin Whiskey' is more of the first with a little rattlesnake venom and black powder poured in.”

The bartender poured their drinks. Joseph drank his first and pointed for another immediately, followed by a third. “Kind of bitter,” he said. “What is it?”

“Mescal. The drink of the people. They make it from a cactus called
maguey.
Best take it easy, Joseph,” Hogjaw warned. “It'll lay you out flat afore you know it.”

A while later Joseph sipped his fourth and leaned forward on his elbows to stare at his reflection in the mirror while he tried to remember just exactly what had happened, what had brought him to bay, cornered him into marrying Lottie Michaelson. There was nothing wrong with her physical attributes, of course. In fact, he couldn't remember when he had experienced such an insatiable and voracious creature. But marriage? That wasn't what he'd set out to do. Not by a long shot.

Entrapped, that's what he'd been. He carried a vivid memory of Lottie sobbing all that first day after her mother died, and then into the night as he held her. Somehow, he had felt sorry for her, he guessed, and he had asked her to marry him and she had accepted. Within seconds, she had changed from a weeping, lost girl to a vixen who covered him with heated kisses and, with her full, ripe thighs pulling him deep inside her, drove him wild with fierce, impassioned lovemaking. The Reverend Kania had married them the next night when they camped. It wasn't until two nights later, in the still hours of the morning as he stood watch over the sleeping wagons, that the full realization of what he had done hit him.

He was married, and marriage was not what he had set out to find. Lottie Michaelson was a peculiar sort of profit, one he could in no way honorably leave. At least there was the land, he had thought, and work enough to keep him occupied. And if the marriage became unbearable, he could always slip away with the knowledge that he hadn't left her destitute. A woman with over a full section of land and a working farm would always be able to attract someone to care for and protect her. His conscience would be clear.

And then came the unpleasant news of that afternoon, and with it the feeling that he was trapped for good with no escape possible. Joseph glared defiantly at Hogjaw, finished his fourth drink, and shakily poured himself a fifth.

The letdown of a journey ended, the cold, the disappointment, had all conspired to make him vulnerable, and the mescal was hitting him hard. Joseph didn't particularly care, though. Drunk was as good as anything else under the circumstances. A little giddy, he raised his cup to toast himself and then froze as the image of Elizabeth Michaelson glided past the door that led to the lobby. “Bitch!” he cursed, downing the drink and shoving away from the bar.

True and Hogjaw watched him weave through the tables on his way to the lobby. Worried, they exchanged glances, paid for the drinks, and left in time to see him catch up with Elizabeth at the front door of the inn.

“Where do you think you're going?” he asked her, catching her by one arm and spinning her around to face him.

Elizabeth grimaced with pain. “Let go of my arm,” she hissed.

Joseph staggered backward, pulling her with him. “I asked you a question,” he said, bracing himself against a chair.

“None of your business.”

“That's right. None. Never anybody's business unless you make it so. You made it my business when you kicked Lottie out of her own wagon and made her ride with me. 'S'your fault. 'S'all your fault.”

“I imagine you kept her happier than my drudgery ever could,” Elizabeth said, trying to pry his hand loose.

Joseph shook her. “She's your sister, goddamnit. Yours.”