Paxton and the Lone Star (50 page)

“Maybe so,” Jack said stubbornly in spite of whatever misgivings he had. He gestured to the trading post which he had built onto the front of his cabin. “But this is all we have in the world.”

“That an' your lives,” Hogjaw pointed out. “They tried to kill True without even askin' what he thought or whose side he was on. They'll do the same to you.”

Jack shook his head. “I don't think so.” He tried to smile, but failed. “You better go if you're going. I know we've never been good friends with the rest of you. It's just … our way, I guess and … well … I love my wife. My place is with her.”

“Have it your own way, then,” Hogjaw snorted. “Let's go, folks.” He pulled Mama's head around and rode to join the wagons outside the gate. “No sense wastin' more time here, 'Lizabeth.”

Elizabeth understood and, leaning forward, touched the storekeeper on the shoulder. “Good luck,” she whispered, and was gone in a cloud of dust.

Jack Kemper watched them go, watched the wagons move up the road, watched Hogjaw's mule ride into and out of the dust they raised. After a few minutes, they vanished behind a rise in the land, and all that was left was the dust. Then it too settled, and he was alone. The afternoon was still. The sun, as he faced it in the west, was warm on his skin. A slight breeze from the south worried the fruit trees he'd set out the spring before. In another year they'd have fruit of their own. Maybe even enough to make peach jam, he thought, or apple butter. Apple butter was best, cold and thickly spread on fresh bread.

Senseless, running like that. How far did you have to run? All the way to Louisiana? Jack walked to the well, lowered the bucket to the icy surface twenty feet down, retrieved it and set it on the stand. Never run away from sweet, cold water, someone had told him. Don't abandon a good well unless you know without a doubt where there's a better one for the having. He took a dipperful and savored each swallow.

“Jack!” Helen called from the doorway.

He hung the dipper on the hook by the crank and started toward the trading post. “Coming …” he said, and stopped short.

Helen had seen them through the window. A dozen Mexican lancers were riding in from the south. Sunlight glinted off their brass trappings. Their green and white uniforms looked almost festive in the distance. “Stay inside!” he shouted and walked toward the front of the trading post to wait in the open.

Their hoofbeats sounded like steady, rolling thunder. Their formation was precise, even rigid, three ranks of men riding four abreast, lances pointing toward the sky.
“Buenos dias!”
Jack shouted, holding out his hands to show he was unarmed and meant no harm.

Onward came the lancers.

“Jack?” Helen called again, concern at last coloring her voice.

“Be quiet,” he yelled back, a little frightened now, himself, and edging toward the front porch.
“Buenos dias,”
he shouted again as they thundered into the yard without slowing their pace.

The lances dipped, pointed straight ahead. Jack spun, took two running steps. Suddenly, there was incredible pain as an iron point skewered him between the shoulder blades and popped, moist and horribly red, from his chest. Jack was lifted off his feet for a few seconds, to wriggle and die a few yards from his front porch.

The lancer yanked and twisted his weapon free of the
norteamericano's
corpse while his companions spread out to fire the buildings. Their
generalíssimo
's orders were explicit: drive the
norteamericano
settlers out, kill those who tried to stay, lay waste to their homes, and rendezvous in San Antonio.

The door to the trading post opened and Helen Kemper stepped outside. She appeared not to notice the soldiers. The lancers made way for her as she gingerly approached the rag doll body of her husband, watched quietly as she pointed at him and, rocking from side to side, began to giggle. It was a chilling sound, and several of the lancers blessed themselves with the sign of the cross. They did not kill the madwoman as they had been ordered, but left the house and trading post as they had all other buildings in their path.

Burning.

Chapter XXXV

Bowie had come down with pneumonia and Travis, who had assumed the mantle of sole authority, listened avidly, even raptly. He had waited for this news and now savored every word of it. His vision had become reality. Santa Anna was on the march, was less than twenty miles from San Antonio and the defenders of the Alamo, the ragtag army that would stop the Mexicans dead in their tracks and so settle the question of independence once and for all. Travis's earlier qualms about defending San Antonio had been forgotten, and he couldn't have been more pleased. The confrontation he had long sought was at hand. His moment in history was assured.

True did not waste time in the telling. He had pushed Firetail, run him hard all the way to town. Now, with the great roan being cared for in the courtyard outside, he stood in the commanding officer's headquarters, once the rectory of the mission, and gave a clipped, concise description of the army he had seen, its location, and the direction of travel. When he finished, Travis leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. “Well?” True asked after a moment of silence.

“I'm thinking.”

“Thinking!”

“Separates the men from the beasts.”

“And the quick from the dead,” True snapped sarcastically. He looked past Travis at Andrew and decided his little brother appeared perfectly ridiculous trying to play soldier without a uniform, and especially as Travis's adjutant. “Hell's bells, Andrew!
You
tell him. There isn't a thing between here and there to even slow them down.”

Andrew gestured helplessly. “Colonel Travis is in command.”

Travis still hadn't opened his eyes. True talked as if the man wasn't there. “Then why the hell doesn't he give a command, for Christ's sake. Wake him up and tell him to give the order to pull out.”

“You are being insubordinate, Mr. Paxton.”

“Insubordinate, my ass. Stow it, Travis,” True said. “I'm not in your misbegotten army.”

The eyes opened. True had his attention. “You may not know it,” Travis said, “but yes you are. Every man here, native born or immigrant, if he's lived here, if he came to raise a family and make a home, is a Texian, and that includes you. If you've left your sweat on this land, which you have, then you're a soldier, and deep down you know it.”

“Spare me the rhetoric, Travis, and give the order to get the hell out.”

“I can't do that,” Travis said, and seeing True's expression, amended his words. “Very well. I
won't
do that. Feel any better?”

True studied him, and decided with a sinking feeling that Travis meant exactly what he said. Getting him to change his mind would be about as easy as convincing an old longhorn bull that he ought to give up his masculinity, but True had to try. There was too much at stake. The settlers outside the walls needed protection, for one thing. And there was no way True could ever hope to find O'Shannon if he was stuck inside, for another. “In God's name, Travis,” he said, making every effort to sound like the voice of reason itself, “this is no time to dance on your pride. You don't have a hundred able-bodied men to put up against—”

“I have almost a hundred and forty men I can count on right now,” Travis corrected. “And more will come the closer Santa Anna gets to us. We'll hold 'til Hell freezes over.”

“Fine. A hundred and fifty say. And what else? You call this a fort? How much food? What happens when they cut off your water? How much powder and shot? Enough to withstand an army that size, whatever that size is? Enough to protect God knows how many civilians, women and children, who are going to crowd in here the minute the first lancer rides into town? Are you willing to sacrifice them so the world will never say Buck Travis ran? Believe me, the world won't care one way or the other.”

Eyes blazing, Travis jumped to his feet. The chair clattered to the floor behind him. “I'm not concerned about the world, Paxton,” he said, spitting out True's name as if it had burned his mouth. “Texas is what worries me at the moment. If we stop Santa Anna here—” He slammed his hand on the desk. “—he's stopped, period. He's whipped. He'll tuck his tail between his legs and run.” Fighting his own anger, he strode to the window. Outside, he could see men hurrying through the courtyard, others pacing sentry duty atop the crumbling walls. His temper under control, he returned to the desk and unrolled a stained and wrinkled map. “You're too good a man to fight with,” he said calmly. “I'd rather have you on my side. Now, look here.” His finger stabbed the map. “I accept the possibility we don't stop him. Very well. Here is your farm and, allowing for a few hours' progress, the probable position of Santa Anna's army right now.” His finger moved east and south. “Over here somewhere, Sam Houston is trying to raise and train an army. A real army. But he needs time.” The finger returned to San Antonio. “And here we are in the middle, metaphorically speaking. I intend to give Sam Houston as much time as I can by keeping Santa Anna busy here. We are entrenched. He can't afford to pass us by and have us harassing his rear. He'll have to take us by storm or siege, and I intend to make it as costly for him as I can. And that, my friend,” Travis said, his eyes narrow and blazing, “will be costly, indeed.”

True stared at the map, looked up to Travis and realized there was no sense in arguing further. “Well,” he sighed, “it sounds like you have it pretty well thought out.” He turned his back on Travis, stalked across the room, and picked up his rifle. “Good luck, I guess.”

“You're leaving?” Travis asked.

“I told my wife and Hogjaw to tell the others I'd meet them tomorrow at Sutherland's Ford. You're damn right I'm leaving.”

The map rolled itself up when Travis let it go. “We need every rifle we can get here in the Alamo.”

“So do Elizabeth and Lottie and all the others,” True said. “I told them I'd join them, and I will.”

Travis's voice was soft and flat. “I'm sorry. I can't let you go. As of this minute, you're conscripted.”

“Oh, really?” True seemed to grow an extra inch. His hands curled around his rifle, and his knuckles were white. “You ought to know, Colonel, that it takes a lot more than one man's word to
conscript
a Paxton when he doesn't want to be conscripted. I'll tell you what, though.” He pointed with his rifle to the door. “There's the door I'm going to walk out. You have until it closes behind me to try to stop me. Any questions?”

Someone outside shouted and a rifle fired, but none of the three men inside seemed to notice. Travis glanced at Andrew, who wore a pistol in his belt. “Lieutenant Paxton? If you please.…”

Andrew looked from True to Travis. “Sorry, Colonel.” His hand stayed well away from the pistol. “I see the sense of what you say and I'll be staying at this
fiesta
until the music stops. But True's my brother. He's never stopped me from doing what I thought was right, and I won't try to stop him. You'll have to find another man for that job.”

True nodded to Andrew, slipped out the door, and hurried down the steps before the headstrong Travis could figure out another way to prevent his departure. Outside, Firetail waited at a hitching post. He'd been rubbed down and watered, but the boy True had promised to pay for taking care of him had disappeared. The horse had had a hard ride, but looked fit enough to make at least another five miles, True decided after a cursory examination. He had just swung into the saddle when the church bells in the center of town began to ring frantically. At the same moment, a trio of buckskin-clad, bearded men raced around the corner and headed for the front courtyard. True felt a quick catch of fear, a tightness in his throat. There was no way that Santa Anna's army could have marched that far that fast. An advance of mounted lancers or riflemen could have, though. And if they had …

Firetail could smell danger. Ears pricked, the stallion trotted across the compound, past a low wall that once might have been an aqueduct, then into the main courtyard and pandemonium. Men were racing for the walls, shouting to each other and to people outside. Gunfire spattered in the distance. The bells in town were ringing, and the mission bell answered. True wove Firetail through the running men, jumped him over a water trough, and aimed for the main gate. To his surprise, the gate swung open without his bidding. He put his heels to Firetail's ribs, and galloped through, swerving sharply to the right at the last minute to avoid a collision with a horse-drawn cart that was racing at full speed toward the safety of the mission walls.

The cart was the leading edge of what turned out to be a veritable stream of humanity. Behind it, the
Calle de la Mission
and the
Camino Real al Presidio
were packed with men and women and children afoot, on horseback, and in conveyances of all sorts. True wanted to go east, which meant he had to cross through the throng. At the same time, Firetail was excited and becoming unmanageable. The only way to get across was to walk him. True continued to where the road turned toward town, dismounted, and eased into the flow, working his way to the far side of the road as he went. Just as he broke through, he spotted Buckland Kania on horseback and managed to catch his attention.

“Bad as that?” True shouted over the noise of the crowd.

The Reverend was having trouble with his horse, too. “Worse,” he said, waiting for True to mount. They stopped a half dozen yards away from the road. “Mexican cavalry, guns and lances. They're pouring into the city, arresting people, riding down others. It's a mess.”

“You think this is a mess, wait until tomorrow. There's a whole army on the way. These are just the van!”