Send Angel! (A Frank Angel Western #2) (16 page)

‘
Ah,
no,’ he said, softly. ‘No need of that at all.’

He leaned back against the desk.

‘
I
have enjoyed our talk, Mr. Angel,’ he said. He picked up a golden
bell and shook it. The door opened and a huge Negro came into the
room.

John,
’ Burnstine said. ‘Mr. Angel is
leaving us.’

‘
Yessuh,’ the man said.

‘
I’m
coming along,’ Mill said, getting to his feet. ‘I want a part of
this.’

Burnstine frowned. Then he
smiled.
‘Of
course, William. You are entitled to your pleasures, too. Goodbye,
Mr. Angel.’

He turned around and went behind the desk,
sitting down and taking another cigar from the teak humidor.

‘
Take
him out and kill him,’ he said and his voice rasped like a file on
steel.

Metter had disobeyed
Angel
’s
instructions; but heading back now with the patrol towards Fort
Daranga he did not think his friend would mind. Riding like the
wind, he had pushed back towards the Rincons. The horse was a good
one: Metter had raised him from a foal, and it had saddened him to
use on such a fine animal the Apache tricks he had finally needed
to employ to make it continue until he found the patrol led by
Lieutenant Blackstone. The Apaches could make a horse abandoned by
a white man get up and run another fifty miles. What they did to
make the horse run was unpleasant but highly effective: Metter
winced as he remembered the experience, but it had been necessary
and it had worked. He had intercepted the patrol well back of the
place where the raiders had turned away from Boot and Mill. A
trooper had been detailed to ride one of the pack mules and with a
fresh mount between his knees, Metter had piloted the patrol at a
flat gallop up through the central pass of the Rincons, taking them
on a line which formed the string to the bow of the raiders’ trail.
They had come down out of the hills as the raiders came around
them, and in a running fight on the scrub-dotted malpais, the
sixteen troopers had taken a savage and exultant revenge upon the
men who had done the senseless killing in the high chaparral
ranches. The mercenaries, outnumbered and with no stomach for a
real fight, had tried to run for it, and the cavalrymen had cut
them down without compassion. Of the dozen raiders, seven had been
killed. One cavalryman was dead. The surviving raiders had been
bound hand and foot, then a rope, noosed around each neck, had been
linked between each of them and they were being led, none too
gently, in single file back to face justice at Fort
Daranga.

They arrived at the Fort in
mid-morning to find it in turmoil. The raiders were shoved
unceremoniously into the guardhouse, the men dismissed. They
hurried to the bunkhouses to hear the story that Metter and
Lieutenant Blackstone were being told at the same time by a tall,
slender major who had arrived at the Fort only an hour before them.
Major Patrick Janson was a member of the personal staff of the
General of the Army, and his mission was to deliver orders to
Colonel Brian Thompson which required his presence as a principal
participant in a General Court Martial at Fort Leavenworth on
charges of gross misconduct. Thompson had been two hours gone,
leading the patrol south in pursuit of the fugitive Larkin, when
Janson had arrived. The major was ensconced in the Commanding
Officer
’s
quarters, awaiting his return with some anticipation. There is
nothing so universally detested by a professional soldier as the
discovery that a brother officer and gentleman has abused the rank
and privilege of his command. Major Janson had seen some of the
evidence which was to be presented at the Court Martial, and it was
damning. It consisted of documents showing payments of sums of
money, IOUs, unpaid bills of substantial amounts for liquor, the
scrawled affidavits of half a dozen men whose names were unknown to
him. They had arrived by mail in a package postmarked from St
Louis, Missouri, without any covering letter. Whoever the anonymous
sender was, he had presented the United States Army with an open
and shut case against Thompson. Janson was certain the man would be
stripped of his rank, drummed out of the Service, discharged with
complete ignominy. There had been another set of orders for
Lieutenant Peter Burford Ellis. The discovery that Ellis had been
killed the preceding night in an escape made by a prisoner from the
guardhouse had to some extent been a relief to Janson. He took no
pleasure from seeing the service in disrepute. Bury the man and the
accusations, he thought: so much the better.

Some of this he told the two
men: the part which concerned them. He told them about
Larkin
’s
break-out, the evidence of the guards that Larkin had a gun, the
patrol of twenty-five men headed by Colonel Thompson which was
pursuing the fleeing man. He told them who he was and where he was
from. He did not tell them why he was in Fort Daranga, and was
thankful that neither man asked.

‘
You
think that Larkin’s escape may have been an inside job?’ Metter
asked.

‘
It
seems possible, at least,’ Janson said. ‘There is no doubt that he
managed to get hold of a gun somehow.’

‘
Who
had he talked to?’

‘
The
guards say that Lieutenant Ellis spent some time in Larkin’s cell
questioning him. But’ - he raised a hand - ‘Ellis left his gun with
Sergeant Battle. So we must not jump to any conclusions,
gentlemen.’

‘
And
Ellis is dead, so we can’t ask him,’ Blackstone mused. Janson
nodded. ‘A little - ah, pat, perhaps,’ he said. ‘When Larkin is
taken we shall find out.’

‘
He’ll
be hard to take,’ Metter said. ‘He rode south, you say?’

Janson nodded.

‘
Heading for Daranga, mebbe,’ Metter continued. He turned to
Blackstone. ‘Can you let me have a hoss?’

‘
I
think we can do that,’ Blackstone said. ‘When I tell the Major your
part in taking those raiders, I’m sure he won’t argue.’

‘
Give
Mr. Metter anything he needs,’ Janson said crisply. ‘Then perhaps
you’d be kind enough to come back here, Lieutenant. I’d like to
hear your version of the events of the last week - in
detail.’

‘
Yes,
sir!’ Blackstone said, enthusiastically. He accompanied Metter
outside and sent an orderly running to the stables to fetch a fresh
mount. He smacked a fist into the palm of his hand.

‘
God,
Metter!’ he said, ‘I’d forgotten what real officers were
like.’

‘
I
know what you mean,’ Metter replied. ‘I’d say things are going to
be right lively at Fort Daranga.’

‘
And
about time,’ Blackstone said, ‘about time!’

Metter swung into the saddle.
He patted the canteen of water lovingly.
‘I’ll drink that before I’ve gone a
mile,’ he grinned.

‘
Good
luck, Metter,’ Blackstone said, his face going serious. ‘If you see
Angel, tell him we evened the score, won’t you?’

‘
I’ll
tell him,’ Metter said, and touched the spurs to the horse’s side.
Frisky from the stables, the bay moved off at a steady lope. Metter
neck-reined it around to the south, and headed out towards
Daranga.

‘
This’ll do. Get down, Angel.’

Mill
’s voice was silky. They were perhaps
three miles out of Tucson, but they might well have been a hundred.
They were in a narrow defile, the weather-scoured rocks relieved
only in a few places by scattered clumps of brush which clung
precariously where an earth-filled crevice gave them root-hold,
huge rocks and thickets the only breaks in the dun contours. The
stillness of the place closed in on them, and the blazing sun hung
in a vault of brazen white, its heat tangible. Nothing moved. No
lizard scuttled, no jackrabbit loped between bushes. It was as if
death lived in the place, enforcing on the natural life an
unnatural stillness, the quiet of the grave.

Mill
’s command was almost a relief.
Through the miles they had ridden, Angel had felt a crawling
tension ever-present between his shoulder-blades. They could have
shot him anywhere, at any time. All through the journey the Negro
had not spoken once. Now he had dismounted and was unstrapping a
folding shovel, such as the Army carried on field expeditions, from
the saddle.

‘
Get
down, I said!’ Mill’s command was repeated and this time emphasized
by a gesture from the gleaming carbine canted across his chunky
thighs.

Angel shrugged, lifting his leg
over the
saddle horn and sliding down to the ground effortlessly, in
spite of his bound hands. The Negro dropped the shovel to the
ground and came around both men in a wide half circle, taking no
chances of getting between them. He produced a wicked-looking
folding knife which sliced through the ropes binding Angel’s hands
like butter. Angel stood rubbing his forearms to get the
circulation moving again as the Negro stepped back, and unhurriedly
as ever unhitched a sawn-off Greener shotgun from the pommel of his
saddle, where it hung from a rawhide loop. He covered Angel as Mill
dismounted.

Mill kicked the shovel towards Angel.

‘
Dig,’
he said.

‘
You
mind if I get my blood moving first?’ Angel asked.

‘
Diggin’ll do it,’ Mill said. ‘Quit stallin’.’

‘
If
you’re planning to cut me down anyway, I’d just as soon not
bother,’ Angel told him.

‘
I
don’t mind persuadin’ you some,’ Mill said. An evil light kindled
his eyes, as the idea threaded into the sick part of his brain. He
reached up on his saddle and uncoiled a braided rope. The Negro
watched.

‘
The
Senator he din say nothin’ about whuppin’ him,’ he said
mildly.

‘
He
didn’t say nothin’ about not whippin’ him, neither,’ Mill said.
‘Just keep that thing pointed at him. Move over to one side a bit,
while I see if I can’t get him to co-operate.’ He let the reata
whistle through the air as he swung it. He flicked it at Angel’s
face, and Angel flinched backwards. The rope whistled back as Mill
flicked it, and the rough braids whipped a welt on Angel’s
cheek.

‘
Purty,’ hissed Mill. He licked his thick lips, his breath
coming heavily.

Again he looped the rope, again
flicking it out like the striking tongue of a snake. Angel stepped
back, stumbling over a rock. Before he could regain his balance,
Mill struck. The rope flayed across Angel
’s back, ripping his shirt. Specks of
blood tinged the cotton, spotting the gay Mexican
colors.

‘
Lovely,’ Mill muttered.

Angel looked at the other
man.
‘You
going to let him do this?’ he shouted. ‘Can’t you see he’s sick?
Look at him - he’s sick inside! He’s enjoying it, it’s giving him a
thrill!’

The big eyes flickered in the dark face, and
then went studiously blank. He said nothing as Mill again twirled
the rope.

‘
Sick,
am I?’ Mill grinned. His lips were wet and loose, and sweat patches
darkened his shirt. ‘How’s that for sick, my purty boy?’ Again the
whistle of the rope; this time Angel dodged it.

‘
Stand
still, damn you!’ screamed Mill. ‘Make him stand still, you stupid
idiot!’

There was a demented look in the piggy eyes.
His fat thighs were shaking with some inner excitement. He caressed
the rope as it passed through his chubby hands, crooning to it.

‘
Lovely, lovely,’ he said. ‘Lovely.’

‘
I
reckon that’s enough, mister,’ the other man said. ‘Why don’t
we-all jest kill him now?’

‘
In a
moment, in a moment,’ Mill hissed. He was coiling the rope again.
Angel played his last card.

‘
Did I
tell you how Johnny died, Willy?’ he said. Mill looked up,
something slipping behind his eyes, a strange wild unidentifiable
flicker on the near side of total madness.

‘
You,’
he screamed, his voice high-pitched, womanlike. ‘You!
Killed!
Johnny?’

‘
I
shot his damned head off,’ Angel said, hurling the words brutally
at Mill like a challenge. Mill heard them and Angel could see the
things behind his eyes working on the picture the words had formed,
and then the light went out and Mill gave a shrill screech that
went up and up and up and he launched himself at the man in front
of him. The Negro jerked backwards, almost pulling the triggers of
the Greener, but he stopped just in time to avoid blowing Mill
apart and in that same second Angel was moving forward in hard and
fast, flinging himself into the reaching fingers of the demented
Mill, who reacted as Angel had hoped he would, clawing at Angel’s
face like a woman, sobbing incomprehensible phrases, his body
between Angel and the tall man.

‘
Leggo, mister!’ shouted the Negro, dancing off to one side
and then back, trying to get a clear shot at Angel. ‘Leggo of
him!’

He might as well have shouted
the words to a tiger at the kill. Mill
’s clawing fingers were trying to
reach Angel’s throat, and he
was kicking and spitting, his weight bearing the
lighter man back
wards.

The Negro let one of the
barrels of the shotgun go into the ground, the explosion
penetrating Mill
’s crazed mind. His grip loosened momentarily and in that
moment Angel flicked the gun from the holster at Mill’s side,
straight-arming the fat man away from him and bringing the sixgun
into deadly unerring action in one blur of movement.

The Negro was good, very good.
He saw the movement, read it, was moving to the side even as Angel
fired, but Angel had fired his three shots knowing that the man
would move and the first slug hit the Negro high in the chest, on
the right side, the second in the neck, tearing out the larynx and
the soft muscles of the throat. The third hit him just below the
nose. The combined force of the impact drove the man over
backwards
dead on his feet as Angel hit the ground and the Negro’s
fingers tightened involuntarily on the triggers of the sawn-off
Greener. The huge
zzboooomjl
as the gun went off shocked the silence of the badlands and
the wicked, tearing, close-grouped shot hit Mill just above the
base of his spine, all of them in a space that could have been
covered by a man’s hand, bursting through him in a terrible red
welter of spraying tissue, hurling the fat man sideways in a
tattered heap. Mill lay screaming, his eyes wide open, the middle
of his body a nightmare. He scrambled around on the ground, biting
through his lips in agony, his eyes sightedness with pain. Angel
picked himself up warily, the .45 cocked and ready in his hand,
although he knew he would not need it. He went over to Mill. The
screaming had stopped now, and Angel knew the man had bitten his
tongue so badly that it had swollen to fill the whole mouth. Mill
looked at Angel. The sickness was still there, far back, behind the
agony. Angel shook his head.

You can hear me,
Willy,
’ he
said. A sound came from the thing
on the ground. It might have been assent,
or a plea for something else.

‘
I
wanted you alive, Willy,’ Angel said. ‘I wanted you to hang. Maybe
this way is better. This way you pay the full price: for Freeman,
and Maclntyre, Stevens, all those men you killed up in the high
country. And for the girl, Willy. Especially for the
girl.’

He slung the shotgun on to the
pommel of the saddle and tied the reins of the horses together,
holding them as he mounted his own dun. He looped the reins around
the pommel and moved the horse away from where the fat man lay,
with eyes imploring, begging, and the throat working to make a
sound, a plea. Angel moved the horse down the defile and headed for
the open plain. He kept his mind resolutely closed to what would
happen to the fat man back in the defile, and he did it with
complete success until he was about a quarter of a mile away. Then
he heard Mill scream. It was a wild and awful sound, totally
insane, a sound that bounced off the canyon walls and echoed into
the deepest recesses of Angel
’s consciousness. The scream went on, a sound of
purest animal terror and the scream was a word and the word, long,
drawn-out, and terrible, was ‘No!’

Angel shook the reins and the horse moved
into a lope, heading west. Behind him the buzzards floated down
gently on the rising hot air, easing down towards the grisly thing
below. Angel did not look back.