West Texas Kill (17 page)
Authors: Johnny D. Boggs
Savage backed out, and off the boardwalk, grabbed the reins to his gray, and swung into the saddle. Chance watched Bucky Bragg help Grace Profit into the saddle of his horse, then Bragg mounted the Andalusian. Quickly, Chance looked at the round corral where he had left their horses. Sure enough, the sorrel and Wickes's brown were still grazing. Hearing the footsteps, Chance stepped aside to let Doc Shaw and Eliot Thompson walk out and mount their horses.
Slowly, Chance eased down the hammer on the Winchester Centennial.
“Just follow your orders, Sergeant.” Savage tipped his hat, then raked his spurs over the gray, and led the Rangers and Grace Profit down the main street, turning south, kicking up clouds of dust.
“That low-dealing bastard.” Moses Albavera pushed his way past Chance and stepped off the boardwalk, raising clenched fists in his manacled hands, shaking them at the dust the wind was blowing away. “You son of a bitch! You swine!” He whirled, ripped off his hat, and slammed it onto the warped boards. “Sergeant Chance, I want to swear out a complaint. Your high and mighty Texas Rangers just stole my damned horse.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Whereas we, the undersigned men of Company E, Frontier Battalion, Texas Rangers, having risked our lives innumerable times for better than a decade, and having been ignored, mistreated, and maligned by the stupidity of our duly elected leaders and commanding officers in Austin, having been underpaid, shot at, wounded, and having been forced to bury our dead, having been abused by the damned Mexicans that dominate this territory, below and above the Rio Grande, we hereby declare that the encroachments of Mexican banditti and Austin politics make us fully justified in withdrawing from the state of Texas and forming our own union, appropriately named Savage, effective immediately.
Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of the ends for which it was established, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government.
Thus said your country's founding fathers. Thus says Captain Hector M. Savage, captain, Company E, commanding, hereby known as President Savage, the first commander in chief of our new province.
The newly christened empire of Savage shall be defined as being the land currently west of the Pecos River in what has been heretofore called the state of Texas to the current boundary with New Mexico Territory to the north and the current boundary with the nation, loosely defined, of Mexico to the south, bordered there by the Rio Grande Del Norte, following the course of said river to approximately 10 miles northwest near the village of Pilares in Chihuahua, Mexico, proceeding thereupon at a north by northeast direction through Van Horn's Well and Hurd's Pass, proceeding east of the Salt Lakes region until it intersects with the Pecos River again at the border of New Mexico Territory.
To wit: the current counties in the state of Texas known as Reeves, Pecos, and Presidio.
This new country of Savage is open to trade with the state of Texas and the countries of Mexico and the United States of America. The railroads running through this country called Savage may continue to do so unimpeded pending a security deposit of $100,000, which can be delivered to President Hector M. Savage at Fort Leaton, outside of Presidio, which will serve as our new nation's capital. Stagecoach travel may also continue without delay, pending a security deposit in the amount of $25,000, which can be delivered to President Hector M. Savage at Fort Leaton, outside of Presidio, capital of Savage. The military commanders at the United States Army outposts of Fort Stockton and Fort Davis are ordered to lower their flags and withdraw all military personnel east across the Pecos River into Texas or west across the Reeves and Presidio county lines and into the current Texas county of El Paso. The State of Texas must also pay Savage $200,000 because we say so. It is right, and a fairâbelow fair, actuallyâprice to pay for all we have been through since being assigned to this country in 1874.
Failure to make these payments in a timely manner will lead to the deaths of hostages being held at Fort Leaton. These hostages include Leonard J. Childress, mayor of Sanderson, Texas; Leviticus Hendry, state representative and barber from Presidio, Texas; Father Miguel de la Vega, priest at the Our Lady Of Guadalupe Catholic Church in Presidio, Texas; Linda Kincaid, whore from Terlingua, Texas; Nelson J. Bookbinder, captain, and three of his enlisted men, troopers Sam Jennison, Ricardo Milano and Hans Kruger, 3rd United States Cavalry, formerly stationed at Fort Davis but captured by Company E, Texas Rangers at La Mota Mountain; and Grace Profit, formerly a saloon owner in the town of Marathon, Texas.
Acceptance of these demands, as well as a deposit of ten percent of the aforementioned duties payable from the Southern Pacific, Wells Fargo Company and other stagecoach companies, and the state of Texas, should be sent to President Hector M. Savage at Fort Leaton, capital of Savage, no later than the seventeenth hour of Sunday, the twenty-ninth of November, in the Year of Our Lord Eighteen and Eighty-five.
Justly affirmed,
Hector M. Savage
Jasper J. “Doc” Shaw
Bucky Bragg
Taw Cutter
Eliot Thompson
Joe Newton
Tom O'Brien
Demitrio Ahern
Oliver Drago
Steve Coffman
Bill Barr
P.G. Foner
J. K. Scheidner
Harry Jones
Munge McSween
All of the signatures were in Hec Savage's handwriting.
After rereading the note, making sure he understood everything Savage had written, had ordered, Chance handed the papers to Albavera. As the black man began reading, sniggering and shaking his head, Chance stepped onto the street, and made a beeline for the corral, ignoring the mercantile owner, Rodney Kipperman, who kept asking, “What's going on here, Ranger?”
Once he had leaned the Winchester against the post, Chance ducked underneath the rails, grabbed his bridle, and caught up the sorrel. The mercantile owner gave up, let out a sign of exasperation, and went inside his store.
Silently, Chance slipped the headstall onto the gelding, and led the horse to the gate, then threw on blanket and saddle. He was cinching up the saddle when Moses Albavera entered the corral.
“Your captain is crazy as a loon.” Albavera shook his head. “Secession. That went over really good the last time you stupid white-ass Southerners tried it. Christ Almighty. What was that his man told me? âNo niggers allowed in Savage'? I suppose they'll kick all the Mexicans out of this new kingdom, too. They're all insane.”
“The captain's a lot of things”âChance pulled on the horn, satisfied, and stepped away from the sorrelâ“but crazy isn't one of them.”
“You might belong in Bedlam yourself. Hell.” Albavera waved the note in his hand. “Did you read that? He wants to form his own little country out of three Texas counties. He and those Rangers declared their independence, but I don't think that's the will of the people, especially the Mexicans your captain doesn't regard too highly. What do you think Don Melitón'll say to that?”
“You want to ask him?” Savage grabbed another bridle hanging on the fence.
With a snort, Albavera shook his head, and picked up the blanket and saddle to the late Lieutenant Wickes's horse, carrying them after the sergeant.
“All right,” Albavera said when he had set down the saddle and blanket beside the brown horse. “What do you think your captain's doing?”
“I don't know.”
“Some kind of political statement?”
Chance handed the reins to Albavera, and grabbed the blanket, set it on the brown's back, made sure it was straight, then heaved the saddle onto the horse. He shook his head. “No. Captain never was much for politics.” He tossed a stirrup over the saddle, reached down and grabbed the girth.
“I guess I can see that.” He looked at the note again, shaking his head. “His language isn't exactly that of Jefferson or Lincoln. You plan on doing like he says?”
“Some of it.”
“He did order you.”
“Uh-huh. But the captain always said orders were made to be ignored. Besides, I have my own notions.”
“Well, what do you think the governor, the army, and the citizens will do when they hear about Captain Savage's demands?”
Chance pulled the latigo tight, tucked the end in the slit, then reached inside his vest pocket and withdrew a key. “Savage says payment must be made by the twenty-ninth. That's four days.” He leaned against the saddle, staring off toward the south, watching the dust rise into the skies. He pictured Grace Profit, and wondered if she knew Savage was threatening her life. What was it Grace had said? Captain Savage believes in the sanctity of womanhood. Yeah, sure he does. He said he'd kill Grace and the prostitute from Terlingua, even a priest. Even soldiers of the U.S. Army.
Chance let out a haggard breath. He spoke in a whisper. “Or he'll start killing the hostages he has at Fort Leaton.”
Albavera shook his head. “And you say he's not crazy?”
Four daysâuntil 5:00 P.M. Sunday the 29th. Chance looked up. The sun was directly overhead. Actually, three and a half days. He let out a muffled curse, and faced Albavera, fingering the small key he held in his right hand. “No way the Southern Pacific, the stagecoach company, or the state could make that deadline.”
“And the Army? Don't forget, Savage says they have to vamoose, too.”
“Generally the Army wouldn't stick its nose in this fight. It's a civil matter. But Savage made it a military affair by taking some soldiers hostage. The Army will have to react, with or without a request from the governor. As soon as they find out what Savage has demanded, what he's doing, troops will head down to Fort Leaton to get those boys of theirs back.”
Albavera swore and spit. “That might get Grace Profit killed.”
“Maybe.” Chance studied the key, then looked again at his prisoner.
“Well, do you plan on going to Sanderson, catching the train, and delivering this note”âAlbavera waved the note in his fingersâ“to your Ranger boss or Governor Ireland?”
Chance stepped away from the horse, and in front of Moses Albavera, who looked stunned as Chance took one of his hands in his own, and slid the key into the handcuff's lock. “Eastbound's not due till Sunday,” Chance said. “It's four hundred miles from here to Austin. I couldn't get to Austin by Savage's deadline if I tried. Certainly couldn't get word to Savage of Colonel Thomas's and the governor's response by then.”
“You could telegraph Austin from Sanderson. Wait for a reply. Providing Savage hasn't cut those wires, too.”
Chance looked up, face-to-face, eye-to-eye with Albavera, his key still in the lock. Would Captain Savage have had the telegraph lines east of Sanderson cut, too? Had he ordered Chance to Sanderson knowing that? He looked down, turned the key. No, Savage wouldn't send him on some forlorn hope. He needed Austin to know what he planned to do.
What he
said
he planned to do.
said
he planned to do.
“That's right,” Chance said. “That's all I can do. Savage knows this. When Colonel Thomas gets that telegraph, he'll blow his top. Likely send a company of Rangers, and plenty of Southern Pacific railroad detectives on a special train. They'll storm Fort Leaton, with or without the Army's help. Texas and the Rangers won't make any deals. Not with Captain Savage. Not when they hear this.”
The iron manacles dropped to the dirt.
“The Army'll help,” Albavera said. “I don't hold most of those soldier boys in high regard, not when it comes to poker, faro or anything else like that, but they aren't yellow. Those Army boys will want Savage's hair.”
“That's right. Savage knows that as well.”
Albavera began rubbing his wrists. He stepped back, studying Chance, not quite sure what to make of all that. “You think you know your captain pretty well, eh?”
“I don't think. I've ridden with Captain Savage for seven years. He calculates everything. He knows what Colonel Thomas will do, knows what the Army will do. And he's not crazy enough to think he could actually form his own little country and kick out the United States Army. He knows the S.P. will never agree to his toll charges, or whatever the hell he called it in that stupid letter he wrote. Nor will the stagecoach companies that run along the old Butterfield trail. He's not crazy.”
“He sure fooled me.”
Chance handed the reins to the brown gelding to Albavera. “I'm riding to Fort Stockton. I'll tell the commanding officer there what has happened.”
“Isn't Fort Davis closer?”
“Yeah. A little. But I don't want to meet up with Don Melitón or his men. I'll tell the commander at Fort Stockton, and he'll send a galloper to Fort Davis. Both posts will send a lot of troops south to Fort Leaton.”
“Am I going with you?”
“No. I want you to ride to Sanderson. Send that wire to Colonel Thomas in Austin.”
With a wry grin, Albavera asked, “What makes you think I'll do that? This isn't my fight.”
“Sure it is. âNo niggers allowed in Savage.' Remember?”
The grin turned upside down into an angry scowl. Albavera's eyes hardened. “Yeah,” he said, barely audible. “I'm not likely to forget that.” Louder. “You trust me?”
“I don't have a choice. I have to alert the Army. And I have to get word to Austin. I can't do both.”
“Suppose I go to Sanderson. Suppose I send your telegraph. Then what?”
“I don't care.”
Albavera chuckled. He rubbed the brown's neck. “Do I get to keep this fine little gelding?”
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