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“I am the widow of an elder son too long dead; she who failed to produce a male heir to the House of Castillo. Don Eduardo tolerates me, nothing more. His younger son and heir Diego hates me and would like to see me sent away from here forever with nothing but the clothes on my back.
“As for the vaqueros, the ranch hands and pistoleros, they ride for Don Eduardo. They belong to him, like his horses and cattle. All but a few, who are loyal to me.”
Sam dug into some steak and eggs while she talked. He was still hungry; the food was good. Lorena ate little, picking at her food, mostly pushing it around on her plate. She had business to transact.
“So much for my situation,” she said. “Now for yours. You are sitting on a powderkeg.”
“Not the first time. I’m used to it,” Sam said.
“The only thing Don Eduardo hates more than Indios is a Tejano, a Texan.”
“That lets me out. I’m from Minnesota, way up north.”
“He hates all Anglos. Texans most of all, but other Anglos almost as much.”
“But you don’t share his sentiments?”
“I have no love for the Texans. If Don Eduardo were not a hard man, they would have run him out long ago and stolen Rancho Grande for themselves. But unlike him, I know that all Anglos are not alike. After all, you Yanquis fought a war with the Texans.”
“Because they were part of the Confederacy, trying to break up the Union,” Sam said. “With all respect, Señora, the war is over. We’re all Americans now.”
“That includes the folk of Rancho Grande, too,” he added pointedly.
“That presidential warrant you carry is no peace treaty,” Lorena said.
“Keeping the peace is my business,” Sam countered.
“Is that what you were doing at the ford when you killed those men?”
“Who says I killed anybody?”
“Sombro. He is half Yaqui Indian and the best tracker in these parts. No white or red man can read signs better. And he served the Delgado long before coming to Rancho Grande,” Lorena said.
She put down knife and fork, all pretense of eating forgotten. She leaned forward, intent. “What really happened at the crossing?”
“Some outlaws jumped me. I was lucky; they weren’t,” Sam said.
“That is all of it?” Lorena pressed, openly skeptical.
“What else could there be?”
She sighed, shaking her head. “And here I thought we were getting along so well.”
“Aren’t we?”
“We need to come to a mutual understanding, hombre, and time is running out. It is lucky for you that that warrant came into my possession. I am the only one who knows what it is and what it means. A man who bears a commission from the president of the United States is a man worth knowing. As for Alma, she cannot read. But she knows how and when to keep silent.
“Don Eduardo and the others think you are nothing more than a professional gun, a bounty hunter. The
padrone
took note of that strange weapon of yours, the half-rifle and the box of parts that go with it.”
“I’m a sportsman, and that’s nothing more than a custom-made hunting rifle,” Sam said.
“Hunting what? Men?” Lorena said, scoffing. “And that black book of circulars of wanted outlaws. There was no way to keep Don Eduardo from seeing that. It was well; it helped convince him that you are nothing more than just another bounty killer. Of which the county already has more than its share. Each rustler or robber you take will be one less thorn in his side.
“He may even have a use for you himself, if he can hire you to kill his enemies. Wade Hutto, the man who runs Hangtown, is a deadly rival of the
padrone
. He has many guns, too many for the Castillo to go up against directly.
“But if Don Eduardo or Diego should suspect that you are more than just another gringo pistolero—much more—it would not go well for you,” Lorena said.
“And the reason why you don’t tell him?” Sam asked.
“Why should I? What’s in it for me? A saying I learned from you gringos, by the way,” said Lorena.
“Somehow I doubt the sentiment is new to you.”
“What of it? That is the way of the world. But the truth of it was brought home to me living on this ranch as a poor relation.”
“Is it as bad as all that?”
“Don Eduardo tolerates me. I can go nowhere, do nothing without his permission. Diego hates me but hides it in the presence of his father. He lives for nothing except the day the
padrone
dies and he becomes master of the ranch. On that day he will throw me out with nothing more than what I can carry by myself.”
Sam’s plate was clean; he pushed it away from him. He poured himself a cup of coffee from a silver pitcher. “What can I do for you, Señora?” he asked.
“I am no fool,” Lorena said. “Change is coming, I know that. With the war done the Union Army will come here in force, they will be the power in the land. A friend with influence in those circles would be most useful indeed. As that warrant shows, you are that man.
“If you live,” she added.
“I’ll do my best,” Sam said.
“I will keep your secret. But true friendship resides on a basis of mutual trust and equality.”
“What would persuade you of my sincerity, Señora?”
“To start with, tell me what really happened at the ford.”
“You already seem to know plenty.”
“Only what Sombro told me of the signs he read,” Lorena said. “A wagon with many guards made the crossing at Mace’s Ford. They were ambushed by bandits. The guards were killed and the wagon stolen. Some of the bandits stayed behind. They loaded the dead men on a second wagon to take them away and hide them. A man came along and killed the bandits—you.”
“That’s pretty close as far as it goes,” Sam said, nodding.
“What did the bandits steal?”
“Just between the two of us, an army wagon was making a secret shipment to Fort Pardee. The guards were disguised as civilians to throw robbers off the scent.”
“That did not work so well.”
“Somebody must have talked out of turn to the wrong people.”
Lorena was excited now, dark eyes flashing, high color blazing in her cheeks, red lips parted. She breathed hard, her chest rising and falling. “What were they carrying? Gold?”
“Something better than gold,” Sam said.
“Bah! What’s better than gold?”
“Guns.”
“One thing our poor county has in abundance is guns,” Lorena scoffed.
“Not like these,” Sam said. “A gross of brand-new Henry rifles—one hundred and forty-four repeating rifles and the ammunition to go with them. Enough firepower to set the Southwest ablaze, in the wrong hands.”
“Who were the robbers?
“I wish I knew.”
“You must have some idea, gringo.”
“The ones I tangled with at the ford were white men, outlaws. It was a big job, well-planned and carried out. Only a handful of bandit chiefs could have pulled it off.”
“The guns must be worth much money.”
“To the army they are. You can imagine what would happen if they came into the hands of Wahtonka and his Comanche bucks. The cavalry at Fort Pardee would be hopelessly outgunned, they wouldn’t stand a chance. They’d be wiped out. There wouldn’t be a town or a ranch left unburned between here and Dallas.
“The army will pay plenty to get them back,” Sam said.
“How much?” asked Lorena, her expression both dreamy and calculating.
“It’s too early for them to have posted a reward. If I had to guess, I’d say Washington will go anywhere from five to ten thousand dollars.”
Lorena’s mouth turned downward at the corners, pouting. “That is not so much.”
“That’s for the recovery of the guns,” Sam said. “There’s sure to be a price on the heads of the outlaws who took them, too. They robbed an army convoy and killed a lot of soldiers. The bounty on their heads could total another twenty, twenty-five thousand dollars.”
Lorena brightened up. “A not unworthy sum, gringo, even when split two ways.”
“Sure,” Sam said, “all you’ve got to do is find the robbers and take them. That’s all.”
“That is what you are here to do, no?”
“It is now.”
“You will hunt them?”
“Me and every other lawman and manhunter in the west.”
“But they do not have your connections,” Lorena pointed out. “A big job for any man, though, and that man a stranger to Hangtree.”
“I’m a quick study,” said Sam.
“. . . We could help each other, eh, gringo?”
“What do you bring to the table, while I’m getting shot at?”
“I have lived here all my life. I know much about Hangtree and those who live here. Things that could save a man’s life or end it,” Lorena said. “And even if you find the bandits by yourself, what then? They are too many for one man. You were almost killed the first time you went up against them, and that was only part of the gang.”
Sam said, “Next time I’ll be more careful.”
“And if you call in the army, they will get the reward money, not you.”
“Sounds like you’ve got a plan, Señora.”
“Always,” Lorena said. “We could work together. My position on the ranch is not an enviable one, but it is not without certain assets. I command a handful of followers loyal to me. Sombro alone is worth a posse of ordinary men. If anyone can find the guns, he can. And there are others, pistoleros, bold and unafraid.
“What do you say, gringo? I make a good friend.”
After a pause, she added, “And a bad enemy.”
“Man can’t have too many friends,” Sam said. “How much is this friendship going to cost me?”
Lorena began, “I am not greedy—” breaking off when she saw the look Sam was giving her.
“No more than is necessary,” she continued.
“How much?” Sam asked.
“Half. Half of everything taken: bounties, rewards, incidentals,” Lorena said.
“That’s not an alliance, it’s a full partnership.”
“Is that so bad?”
“It’s a mite steep.”
“I already saved your life twice. Once by taking that bullet out of you. And again by keeping silent about who you really are and why you are here. So far I have done all the giving and you the taking. You hardly have reason to complain, gringo.”
“I’m not arguing,” Sam said.
“Trust is so hard to come by in this unhappy world. But we have a basis for mutual understanding. I keep your secrets. By the same token, I must rely on your discretion,” Lorena said. “Don Eduardo must never know of our plans. Once he learns of those stolen guns—and he will, he has a talent for finding out such things—he will move heaven and earth to get hold of them.
“The same goes for Diego. Like me, he would do anything to have money of his own and be free of the
padrone.
”
“When it comes to money—or a lady’s confidences—I’m a closemouthed man,” Sam assured her.
Lorena’s expression took on a faraway look. “With enough money I could leave this ranch, these godforsaken plains. Go to San Francisco, Mexico City. Europe, even—Paris.”
“I wish you luck.”
“It will take more than wishing,” she said, once more all business. “Do we have an agreement?”
“It’s a go,” Sam said. “One or two points I’d like to have cleared up, Señora. What happened to the wagonful of dead guards?”
“Our men found it on Monday. When night came they put it far from here on the road to Hangtree town,” Lorena said. Her expression was cynical, knowing. “Don Eduardo judged that it would not do for it to be found at or near Rancho Grande. That would give the Texans an excuse to blame it on us.”
“Good thinking. And the bodies at the ford?” Sam asked.
“Of the men you killed? We left them there. On Tuesday a posse from town came and took them away.”
“Has the army come in yet?”
“No.”
“They will. Soon, and in force.”
“If they find the stolen guns first, no gold for us.”
“Time for me to get to work,” Sam said.
F
OURTEEN
 
On Thursday noon, two riders approached the Cross ranch.
Johnny Cross and Luke Pettigrew had made some improvements around the place, but the ranch house was a long way from being habitable. It was a wreck, a gutted, stonewalled shell filled with masses of rubble. They hauled out some fallen roof timbers, using them to build a lean-to and to patch up the corral, now well stocked with close to twenty horses. The two men slept outdoors at night in the lean-to.
The horses were a windfall that had come easily, practically falling into their laps. Johnny and Luke were determined that they wouldn’t go the same way. “With all the horse thieves and rustlers hereabouts, we need to safeguard our stock,” Johnny said.
“Dirty crooks!” Luke said with feeling.
“I got an idea,” said Johnny. “There’s a box canyon a couple miles north of here in the eastern slope. A good hiding place, hard to find if you don’t know it’s there. Me and Cal used to pen our stock there when we’d be away from the ranch for any length of time. There’s a spring there and good grassland. The mouth of the canyon is narrow; we closed it off with a gate fence. The two of us should be able to fix it up and get it back into shape pretty quick. We can hide the horses up there when we go out mustanging.”
They spent a long, hard Wednesday repairing the five-bar timber gate that sealed off the covert grazing land of the upland spread.
Thursday morning they labored at various chores and knocked off at midday for lunch. While Luke sat in the shade massaging some of the stiffness out of his sore half-leg, Johnny went to the family burial plot for a few moments of quiet time.
A patch of land stood between the back of the ranch house and the foot of the south slope of the jagged-top hill. Johnny had fixed it up, weeding it, clearing away the dead leaves and bramble bushes that had gathered during years of neglect.
There were three graves: those of his father, mother, and sister Mandy. Pa was the first to die; then Mandy, carried off by scarlet fever at age ten; and finally Ma in the spring of Sixty-One.
The thin wooden headpieces carved with their names and dates and placed at the gravesites had long ago succumbed to the elements and come apart. Johnny replaced them with three simple wooden crosses. Wildflowers grew over the grave mounds.
Johnny let them be, leaving them where they were. It seemed fitting somehow.
No grave here for brother Cal, though; he was buried in a mass grave with thousands of Confederate and Yankee dead who’d fallen at the battle of Shiloh.
Johnny wondered where his final resting place would be. “Boot Hill, most likely,” he said to himself, smiling wryly.
He was already living on borrowed time. He’d narrowly escaped death countless times during the war and afterward. Every day since then was a gift: pure gravy. “And that don’t bother me a bit,” he said.
It was a nice day. The sun was high, hot and shining. Birds roosted in the shady tree boughs. East of the hill, a stream meandered through grassy meadows, sunlight glinting on its surface.
Johnny thought about saying a prayer, but the only one he knew was the one about the Valley of the Shadow of Death, and that didn’t fit the mood. His folks and Mandy had no need of prayers anyhow. They were good people and without doubt had gone to their just reward.
He was the one who could use the prayers. “I’d rather rely on my guns,” he told himself.
He turned away from the graves, looking south. He saw two riders coming north, toward the ranch. They were still a long way off.
Luke must have seen them, too. He rounded the corner of the ranch house, coming into view. “Hey, Johnny!” he called.
“I see ’em,” Johnny said. He went down to the yard in front of the ranch house, joining Luke in watching the newcomers.
Two black blurs crawling across the plains. They came openly, with no attempt at stealth. They came from the southeast, moving diagonally northwest toward the ranch.
“Looks like they come from town on Hangtree Trail,” Luke said.
The trail ran west from Hangtown into the plains, across Adobe Flats into the Breaks just south of Buffalo Hump, continuing westward into the Staked Plains and beyond, clear into New Mexico.
“They’re making a beeline for the ranch,” Luke noted. “Only two of ’em. Wonder what they want?”
“We’ll find out,” Johnny said.
 
 
Twenty minutes passed before the two riders rode into the ranch house’s dirt yard.
Johnny Cross sat on a crude three-legged stool that had been salvaged from inside the ranch house. He was positioned in a patch of shade in front of the structure, sitting with his back against the stone wall to the right of the empty doorframe. Nearby stood a wooden barrel filled with stream water. A rusty iron dipper was secured by a rawhide thong to a nail in the barrel’s upper rim.
Luke was nowhere in sight.
The newcomers were covered with trail dust from what must have been a long, hard ride. They looked tough, hardbitten. Nothing unusual about that. Most of the folk of Hangtree County were hardbitten types. If they weren’t, they usually didn’t last long.
Sometimes they didn’t last long if they were, either.
One was thirty, redheaded, with a same-colored mustache and long, narrow green eyes. He wore a black hat, black leather vest, and a low-slung gun on his left hip.
The other had a thick head of oily black hair and blue-black beard stubble. A handsome man in an overblown way, whose looks were spoiled by narrow eyes and a tight, mean mouth. He wore a round-topped, flat-brimmed hat, and red bandanna. His dark, fancy-patterned shirt would have been more at home in a gambling hall than out on the range. Two guns were worn tied down, gunfighter-style.
Johnny rose, standing up to face the newcomers as they reined in, hands resting easily at his sides, not far from his twin holstered guns. His manner was calm, untroubled.
The redhead’s dirty face was split by a broad, white-toothed grin. His partner scowled like he was sucking on a lemon.
“Howdy,” the redhead said.
Johnny nodded. “What can I do you for?”
The mean-faced man frowned, spat. “Who’re you?”
“Seeing as how you’re on my land, I’m the one who should be asking you that,” Johnny said, his outwardly amiable demeanor unchanged. “Who’re you?”
“You loco or something?”
“He must be new to the outfit,” the redhead said.
“Yeh? Well, he ain’t gonna get much older if he don’t learn some manners.”
“Easy, Reese.”
“Nobody tells me what to do, Red, not even you. And especially not some punk kid.” Reese looked around, his scowl deepening. “Where’s Monty and the rest of the boys?”
“Y’all friends of Monty?” Johnny asked.
“We’re with the outfit. I’m Dan Oxblood,” the redhead said, “and this here’s Reese Kimbro.”
“Kimbro,” Johnny said, thoughtful-like. “You the one they call Killer Kimbro?”
“Looks like some sense is starting to sink into that thick skull of yours, and not a moment too soon,” Kimbro said, smirking. “I reckon the name Killer Kimbro means something even to a snotnose like you.”
Johnny shook his head. “Nope.”
Kimbro’s thick black brows knitted together in a furious frown. His hand hung poised above the gun on his right hip. “You just bought the farm, sonny. You got your guns on. Go for ’em!”
“Whoa now, Reese—”
“Shut up, Red. This is between me and the kid.”
“Not hardly. Take a look at that set of doublebarrels peeking at us from the corner of that window,” the redhead said.
“Shucks, now you went and spoiled my surprise,” Luke said. He was inside the ranch house at the window to the left of the doorframe, sheltered behind the wall, holding a sawed-off double-barreled shotgun that rested on the lower corner of the windowsill so the big holes of the twin bores covered the two horsemen.
Kimbro’s face paled beneath its tan, going sallow. His hand drifted away from his gun, moving well clear of it.
“Hesh up, Reese, and let me me do the talking; mebbe we can get out of this without getting our heads blowed off,” Red said. He turned his face toward Johnny. “You seem like a sensible enough fellow. We ain’t looking for trouble.”
“What are you looking for?” Johnny said.
“Some jaspers we know were camped out this way. We come by to pay them a visit. Social call, you might say.”
“Monty and friends?”
“That’s right. They around?”
“Not any more. They done moved on.”
“Where to?”
Johnny shrugged.
“When’re they coming back?” asked Red.
“Not in this lifetime.”
“So that’s the way of it, huh? Looks like we made this trip for nothing,” Red said. “We’ll be riding out then.”
“You do that,” Johnny said.
“Hope your friend with the scattergun ain’t got no itchy trigger finger.”
“Oh, he won’t shoot at nothing less’n he’s got a mind to. Ain’t that right, Luke?”
“That’s right,” Luke said.
“He’s a peace-loving type,” Johnny said. “Me, too.”
“Fine. That’s fine. Okay we go now?” Red asked.
“Yup.”
“Well, that’s fine,” Red said. “By the way, I don’t believe I caught your name.”
“Cross, Johnny Cross.”
Red stroked a crescent-shaped scar in the corner of his chin. “I heard tell of a fellow name of Cross who rode with Cullen Baker down East Texas way a while back. Cullen, Bill Longley and some other good ol’ boys. Any relation?”
“Could be,” Johnny said.
“Fast crowd. Man’d have to be pretty quick to keep up with that bunch.”
“I like Hangtree better. It’s nice and quiet.”
“You think so? Well, mebbe.”
“You seem like you got some sense, Red,” said Johnny.
“I try.”
“This here’s Cross land. It’s been Cross land for a long time and that’s how it’s gonna stay. You might spread the word around.”
“I’ll do that.”
“That’s fine,” Johnny said. “Y’all can go now.”
“We’re on our way,” Red said.
“Next time we meet, kid, it’ll be even-up. You won’t always have a shotgun covering you,” Kimbro said.
Johnny laughed. “If that’s all that’s bothering you, climb down off that horse and we’ll settle it now. Just you and me.”
“No, thanks. I’ll pick my own time and place.”
“No time like now.”
Kimbro sneered. “Betting against a pat hand is a sucker play. I’ll wait till my deal comes around.”
Red turned his horse’s head away from the ranch house, toward the south. “You do what you want, Reese; I’m riding out.” He touched spurs to the horse’s flanks and started away, the animal moving at an easy lope.
“You talk big, sonny. Got enough sand to keep from shooting a man in the back?” Kimbro said.
“The last thing you’ll ever see is me looking you straight in the eye,” Johnny said.
“Until next time, then,” Kimbro said. He spat on the ground. “See you soon.”
He turned his horse and started after Red, who’d already put some distance between himself and the ranch house.
Johnny stood there, watching the two of them ride away. Luke came out of the ranch house and joined him. “We should have cleaned up on them two when we had the chance,” Luke said.
“It’s a hot day. I didn’t feel like getting rid of any bodies this afternoon,” Johnny said.
“That Kimbro got a nice fat reward on him.”
“Now you tell me. Well, he’ll be back. We’ll bag him yet.”
“Just so he don’t bag us.”
“Kimbro? I heard of him, sure. I made like I hadn’t to rile him up. But it’s the other one, Red, who’s the dangerous one in that combination.”
“Who’s he?”
“Dan Oxblood, from west of the Pecos, a real hellbender. He knows some people I know. Did some gun work with Cullen Baker down in the bosky East Texas country. Moved on before I came along so I never met him. Cullen spoke well of him, though, and he don’t have much good to say about most folks.”
Red and Kimbro angled west, entering the pass to Wild Horse Gulch.
“What’ll you bet they’re heading down to Buffalo Hump, Luke? To that hideout in Ghost Valley?”
“No bet.”
“Dan Oxblood, Kimbro . . . a couple of highpowered gunhawks to be hunkered down in the Breaks. I wonder who else is part of that outfit Red spoke of, and what they’re up to out there.”
“Knowing you, Johnny, I’m sure we’ll find out the hard way. You made Kimbro look small. He’ll be back and he won’t be alone.”

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