[Texas Rangers 06] - Jericho's Road (24 page)

“
Get behind the horse,” he told Tony. That was difficult because the horse kept dancing about, trying to jerk the reins from Andy’s hand and run away. “Then drop down low where they can’t see you through the brush.”

Farley said, “They don’t have to see us to hit us.”

“
We don’t have to make it easy for them.” Andy raised up, trying to see a target. He saw a man moving around to the left. “Tryin’ to flank us,” he said.

Tony tried to aim. Andy took the pistol from his hand. “You can’t hold steady enough to hit the side of a barn. Don’t be wastin’ shells. We’ll need all we’ve got.”

He fired at the flanker. He saw the man drop, then rise again and go hopping back toward the others.

Farley said, “Aim higher, Badger Boy. His leg is too far from his heart.” He had his rifle. He leveled it, squeezed the trigger, and the man fell.

Hewitt said, “Good shootin’.”

“
I got a lot of practice back in the days of the state police. They learned to keep their distance.”

For a while Jericho’s men seemed confused and uncertain, unnerved by Farley’s accurate shot. Every so often they would send a bullet whispering harmlessly in the general direction of the fugitives, who for the most part kept low.

Farley raised up a little, as if inviting a bullet. “Look yonder, up the river.”

Andy had been concentrating his attention on their adversaries and had not paid attention to what was going on to the west. He saw at least a dozen horsemen loping alongside the river toward them. He asked Tony, “Some of your friends?”

Tony seemed to pick up strength. “That old
curandero
must’ve told Tío Lupe that I’d be comin’.”

Andy frowned. “But I’m thinkin’ he told Jericho too. That’s why they were waitin’ for you soon as you left the house. Looks like he lit the candle from both ends.”

Jericho’s men exchanged a few shots with the oncoming riders, then broke and ran for the river.

Tony looked up at Hewitt. “You’re still a Ranger. Tío Lupe had rather shoot a Ranger than eat. I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop him.”

Hewitt seemed to be measuring the distance between him and the Mexicans. “I’d best go report to Sergeant Donahue that his prisoner got away. I’ll be lucky if he doesn’t fire me.”

Andy said, “Tell him it was all my fault. He’ll believe that.”

Hewitt left in a lope, riding eastward to avoid contact with either Jericho’s men or the Mexicans. Andy was relieved to see that no one from either group chased after him. He figured Hewitt would cross over at some shallow point. “He’s a pretty good sort,” he said.

Farley nodded. “At least he doesn’t talk your ears off like Len Tanner. If I was to ever be a Ranger again, I wouldn’t mind havin’ him with me.”

Farley must be mellowing, Andy thought. Usually he had rather have a boil on his butt than to pay anybody a compliment. First Teresa McCawley, now Ranger Hewitt. After this, Andy would not be surprised to see the sun rise in the west.

The first of the Mexican horsemen reined up. Andy was strongly aware of several pistols aimed at him. He raised his hands to shoulder level and tried not to betray any anxiety. Some people fed on others’ fear.

He had never seen Guadalupe Chavez, but he thought he had heard enough to recognize him on sight. He would have picked almost any of the others before he would have chosen the one who turned out to be Chavez. To Andy’s surprise, he was anything but imposing. He was a small, thin man, not much more than five feet tall and weighing perhaps a hundred thirty. His fierce eyes were so dark that they appeared black. A heavy mustache gave his face a fearsome look that belied his size.

He pointed to Jericho’s fleeing men and shouted an order in a voice far stronger than his physical stature would indicate. Most of his men set out in pursuit, spurring into the river.

Only then did he kneel to look at his nephew’s wound. Andy could not understand the conversation, but he sensed anxiety in the older man’s voice. The only word he could pick out was
rinche.

Tony explained, “He thought I was shot again. I told him I would’ve been if you hadn’t come after me.”

Andy saw no softening in Chavez’s malevolent glare. Chavez shifted to English. “You would take my nephew to the Rangers?”

Andy said, “No, we intended to take him back to his mother and stepdaddy.”

“
But you are Rangers, no?”

Andy said, “We used to be. We lost our job.”

“
Not good enough even to be a Ranger? Tell me why I should not shoot you.”

Tony spoke again in Spanish. Andy sensed that he was defending them. He thought it best to let Tony do the talking. Chavez seemed unlikely to listen with patience to a gringo, especially a used-to-be Ranger.

Chavez’s grim countenance softened a little. “Antonio says you are friends of his. You are not friends of mine, but maybe I don’t kill you for a while yet.”

Andy hardly considered himself and Tony to be friends, but he was not about to argue the point. He said hopefully, “Since Tony is safe now, me and Farley will go back and tell his folks what’s happened.”

Chavez narrowed his eyes. “Or maybe go and bring the
rinches?
I think you may be spies for them. I must think on whether I will shoot you or let you go.”

Tony spoke again in Spanish. Andy looked at Farley, who was equally at a loss with the language. A pleading tone indicated that Tony was trying to dissuade his uncle. Chavez did not appear to be yielding much.

Gradually Chavez’s riders began trailing back. Two rode over to look at the man Farley had shot. The others had left him behind. One shouted something to Chavez, who responded by making a slicing motion across his throat. The man leaned down from the saddle and fired once.

Chavez said, “He was not sure the gringo was dead. Now he is sure.”

Andy flinched despite himself.

Farley said, “They do take their politics serious down here.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

C
havez lighted a long black cheroot and stared up at Andy and Farley, his eyes unreadable. Though he was shorter than either man, he seemed taller to Andy. He held out his hand. “Your guns, please.”

Farley hesitated. “I’ve got a sentimental attachment to my guns. I carried one of them all the way through the war. The other one I took off of a state policeman. He’d lost interest in it.”

Andy cautioned, “You’d better give it to him, or he’ll take it away from you the same way you got it.” He forked over his own pistol to one of Chavez’s lieutenants and nodded toward the rifle on his saddle. The man took it too. Farley then gave up. At Chavez’s command a couple of his men helped Tony to his feet. Another led the unfortunate Jericho man’s horse to Tony and carefully lifted him into the saddle. Chavez motioned for the Texans to get on their horses.

Tony slumped, weakened by the reopening of his wound, though the bleeding had stopped. He said, “Sorry, boys. When Tío Lupe gets his head set on somethin’, it’s hard to talk him out of it. But I’ll keep workin’ on him.”

When Chavez was out of earshot Andy said, “From all the stories I’ve heard I thought he’d be a lot bigger, at least as large as Jericho or Jim McCawley. He reminds me of a banty rooster.”

Farley replied, “A fightin’ rooster. Santy Anna was a little man too, and look at all the hell he managed to cause.”

The Chavez riders kept Andy and Farley hemmed up in the middle as they rode westward. It would have been foolhardy to try to run. They had nowhere to go except the river, and they would be cut down before their horses got their bellies wet. Andy tried to rationalize that Tony would soften his uncle’s attitude, but he did not convince himself.

Farley muttered, “You’ve gotten us into a fix this time, Badger Boy.”

“
Me? I didn’t do anything more than you did.”

“
But you’re a jinx. Always was. Everything you get into causes me trouble. It’s a wonder I’m not dead.”

“
You could’ve lit out with Hewitt.”

“
I wish I had. If we was still Rangers maybe Donahue would bring a rescue party and get us out of this. But as it is, I doubt he’ll lift a finger. And it was you that got us fired.”

Andy knew the futility of argument. For every answer he gave, Farley would come up with another complaint. He wondered how Teresa McCawley could see anything romantic about Farley. She would have a hard time gentling him if she managed to hook him, which she seemed to want to do. That was assuming he and Andy survived this scrape.

They came to a sprawling ranch headquarters, a mixture of stone and adobe buildings flanked by an expansive set of corrals built crudely but effectively of brush. It lay a mile or so south of the river. Smoke arose from several chimneys. The smell of burning wood reminded Andy that he had not eaten since last night’s supper. He thought it best not to say anything that might be taken for complaint. He suspected that Chavez had a low tolerance for complaint, nor would he be hesitant in imposing a penalty. He had scarcely blinked when one of his riders had shot the fallen Jericho man.

Chavez barked a series of orders to his followers. Most dismounted and took up defensive positions while the others led their horses into a corral.

Chavez said, “One never knows what the Jericho may do. Come. We go to my house. I will tell the women it is time for
comida
.”

Andy hoped that meant something to eat.

Chavez led them to a large stone house built along the same old Spanish lines as the home of Big Jim McCawley. He motioned for them to dismount and signaled one of his men to lead the horses away. He walked to the hand-hewn front door and beckoned the Texans and his nephew inside.

Farley muttered, “Like a fly into a spider’s web.”

Andy said, “You better do a lot of listenin’ and damned little talkin’.”

Two women came to meet them. Both were relatively young, and one was obviously pregnant. Chavez put his arm around her. The motions of his free hand told Andy he was talking to the women about the boy’s wound.

Tony explained, “An old woman lives here, a
curandera.
She will make me well.”

Andy said, “I hope she’s cleaner than that old man who came to see you at McCawley’s.”

“
That old man was no real
curandero.
He was a spy for my uncle. I told him when I would get away. Tío Lupe and his men waited for me at the river, but because of the Jerichos I could not cross where they expected me. That is why they were late.”

Andy said, “They weren’t the only ones who knew what you figured on doin’. Jericho’s crew was layin’ for you.”

Chavez broke in. “The old man was two times a spy, sometimes for me and sometimes for the Jericho. He will not spy again.”

Andy considered the implication and took no comfort in it. Death meant little to either Chavez or Jericho so long as it was not theirs.

Chavez went to a rustic old wooden cabinet and took out a bottle of some kind. He poured a drink for Tony and one for himself. He did not offer any to Andy or Farley. Instead he pointed to a pair of straight chairs. “You will sit. My men watch outside. If you try to go I will not have to concern myself with you anymore.”

Chavez put his nephew’s arm around his shoulder and took him down a long hall. The women followed. Farley continued to stand. Andy said, “He told us to sit.”

Farley said, “I don’t do somethin’ just because some Mexican tells me to.”

“
Might be a good idea this time.”

Farley sat.

Andy looked about the room. Instinctively he sought any opening that might offer escape, though he knew he would be caught and probably shot the moment he stepped outside. The furnishings were generally of fine quality but showed age and wear. He guessed most went back to Spanish colonial times. The house itself certainly did. It bespoke a more prosperous period, when a don could afford to buy luxuries from Mexico City and even Spain.

Farley said, “Livin’ pretty high for Mexicans.”