Showdown With Fear (4 page)

‘Most of the fellers out there is single men...many of ‘em with no kin if the truth were told... Harry Boak should stick to butcherin’, right!’

‘Okay. If you’re comin’, then stand along here next to me!’ Harry challenged. Three men and Helen Lane walked across.

‘That’s it then... we don’t go!’ Harry said.

‘Well, I got another idea.... we fortify the town and we wait.’ It was Joe again. Heads turned and people looked at him, drop-jawed.

‘Let me get this right... you’re suggesting we make a fort out of the town?’ Harry asked.

It was just the idea that they all wanted to hear, however stupid. It gave them an excuse to back down and pretend they had a plan. Joe talked Harry around to what seemed like a tactic, but which was really just good sense. Joe argued that it was no sense losing another twenty men, and leaving the town vulnerable. Helen didn’t try to talk against the men, but just resigned herself to waiting.

‘So we wait here and we do what?’ Harry asked.

‘I’m just an entertainer... I keep a bar! It was just a safe move, I reckon,’ Joe said.

Harry decided it was time to actually do something. He called everyone together, as some were beginning to drift away.

‘Now, see... Joe here talks sense. I could see some of you folk thinking that you’d just go and bolster up your own homes, look after number one... well, fine, but that ain’t the spirit that dug a foot-hole in this bone-dry place, is it? You older men will recall how this place was nothin’ but one street with a hotel and gunfire, just a little while ago. Now, we built this place... we gotta chapel, and stores, and a proper cemetery. We even got darn good singin’ in the Golden Halls there... now we are gonna fight to keep it good. Right?’

There was a mumbling of approval. Voices shouted out supportive noises. Harry unbuttoned his collar. He was sweating considerably and keen to find a drink. But something had to be decided.

‘Now, see...what is the situation? The situation is that we have a bunch o’ outlaws out there and we seem to have lost our best twenty shooters. Our best men are out over the Pecos chasing renegades, maybe... that’s the worst possibility. Or maybe they’re just a short ride away, tired and hacking slow homewards... right now, eh?’

Harry had found his vocation. He had never really done this before, but he was gaining confidence with every word. All eyes were on him.

‘So what do we do, Harry? De good people are looking to you...’ Witte said.

Harry fumbled in his pockets and looked around, playing for time to think. Finally Helen, who was now sitting down at the edge of the crowd, yelled, ‘we practise hiding... cos we can’t fight... can we?’

‘Sure we can fight,’ Harry looked at the older men. There were maybe thirty who looked capable of shooting straight and riding hard.

‘The point is, we expect whatever... which is likely to be the McVie bunch... like before. You let me pick a group of our best men, and I’ll get started. Now you good folk get on home and stop frettin’. I’m gonna call out some names.’

In a short while, Harry had his best ten men and Helen sitting around him in the hotel bar. He planned a defensive action. If the McVies came, then the idea was to hold one central position. He explained how the chapel was best placed.

‘See, it’s like a little castle. We take over the place and we got one hell of an advantage over six fellers on horseback trying to create mayhem... we just pick’em off!’

‘Sounds fine... but what about the women, children... old folks... they in the chapel with us?’ Helen asked.

‘Hmmm... they need to be out of the way.’

‘Well, this is the worst option. The posse could come back any time. We’ll think it over,’ Helen said.

It was clear to Harry that he had frightened men around him, though. Now they would look to him, and he was only an amateur.

Chapter 4

It was pitch black in the cave now. Everyone was asleep except the look-out. Grip was sitting by the Gatling gun. Pete could see through the chink in the wood, and there was just enough moonlight to show the massive frame of the slow-talking man from the south. His broad hand was splayed across the barrels, which glinted in the light.

Pete could hear the gang snoring. They were lying on the floor covered in coats and skins, mostly a bit tipsy after using up some of the whisky stocks. Even Sara had now managed to cry herself into sleep - into some brief respite from the nightmare of what had happened to her parents. Pete knew that the terrible scene of their murder would be in her mind, being played out over and over again.

He couldn’t sleep, though. His mind was racing, searching every possibility of escape. He went through the list, starting with the obvious: no tunnels at the back behind him, no way he could fight his way out of the entrance, no weapons available. It was looking bleak. He brought to mind all the things he had seen when there was light, earlier. There was no way out then, so one part of his mind told him. But he recalled what his father had always said, that your mind knows no defeat. He thought of Dan, how it was a laid-on certainty that he would be on his way, closer and closer.

First thing, though, was to make sure that Sara was all right. He looked across at her sleeping, and the first signs of sunrise were just stroking the top of the cavern. Pete heard movement, so he looked through the crack again. Grip had left the gun and was moving a large wooden crate to one side. Then he lifted a whole bundle of cloth and skins that were piled over several crates. There was a space big enough to drive a stagecoach in. Pete stared and search every part with his eyes. A beam of early sun then lit up the top, above Grip, who was taking something from a box.

It was stunning! There was a massive cavern behind the pile of crates; a whole chamber, wide open, enough to bunk two hundred men, with food and stores. An army could hide out here, just disappear, he thought. If there was any way out, it was through the crates and into that enormous space.
Who
knows
where
that
might
lead
? He mumbled to himself.

He heard Sam whisper to Grip, ‘Hey whatya doin’ there?

‘Gittin’ some baccy...’

‘Well make it quick. John doesn’t want that lot moved. You wake him up, it’s your funeral.’

It went quiet again, and Pete’s mind was working overtime, working on any scheme that would get Sara and him out of the hole and into the huge cave. One thing was for sure, the McVies had no plans to let them out and give them back to Dan Mullen, no way.

*

Pearce and Dan had been steadily tracking the outlaws’ horses towards the hills. It was late afternoon and they had not had a break for some time.

‘Reckon they killed everyone, Dan?’

‘Can’t say. Why take any prisoners? It’s not the way, not for renegades, which they are.’

‘How far are they ahead?’

‘I’d say we’re three hours behind... ‘course, they know we’re here.’

Ned Pearce was reminded by that little statement, with its sense of being right, that he was just a store-keeper. Business, not fighting, was his game. But he would never let Mullen know that.

‘Mullen, you know I took you for a coward, but I see you different now... the way you fought....’

‘Pearce, you don’t get to be a lawman in New Mexico, on the edge of anything you might call wilderness, by being an expert on fine pants and perfume.’

‘Okay. But I mean, well....oh for Christ’s sake.... there must have been twelve good men cut down there! My friends... sons of my business associates... you know, nuthin’ will ever be the same again for me now.’

Dan believed him. He had never thought that he would hear Ned Pearce speak honestly, coming clean about his feelings like that. Dan put it down to the sun.

‘Pearce... we rest here, then when it’s dark, we go easy and slow to the rocks there, and we find a dark spot. They’ll be expecting us, so we wheel round to the other side... maybe another five miles, but it gives us a chance of staying alive.’

Pearce didn’t argue. He tethered his horse in the trees near the shady spot they found, and then lay out, lighting up a cheroot.

Dan sat on a log and started thinking. He knew for sure that the McVies had the kids, and that it was near certain that John and Sam were gun-trading again. That meant renegades and whatever mad plans they were hatching again. He thought about John McVie, thought about the man’s strange and derailed way of seeing things. There was always some grand plan in his head, never just a normal robbery. He pondered all the factors in the scene. There were renegades who didn’t like the idea of

working for a living. There was a vendetta with a lawman, and there was some scheme to do with getting very rich and skipping out of New Mexico to a clean start.

The facts about John McVie were not easy to ascertain. He was chewing this over, when Pearce cut in. ‘What you thinkin’ on Mullen? You were miles away.’

‘Truth is I was listing things about this John McVie, the leader of this mob.’

‘What’s on the list?’

‘Born in Texas, life of crime, joined the cavalry for a spell... liked killing Sioux. Ran away, found some pals, robbed and killed to have a good time. Eventually met me, and I sort of became, let’s say, significant in his miserable life...’

‘Significant?’

Dan rubbed his unshaven chin, begged a cheroot and after a long drag, said, ‘I hate these things... haven’t smoked one in years, but I need one now, friend. See, I plugged his little brother with my peacemaker here.’

‘How come?’

‘They were drunk, and this Jim McVie, regular scum he was, was cornering a girl... in the broad daylight can you believe... in a street. The beast was wanting to get her into an alley. He was told to reach and leave the girl. Instead, he drew on me.’

‘I see.’

‘I hit him in the throat. The girl had the sense to dive for the ground before anybody pulled a trigger. I wouldn’t mind but the gun I had was a bad make... one of these army Colts, worked loose when you fired, loose screw you see. This here is a beauty. But anyway, John’s little brother, he was buried in some unholy backyard o’ town.’

‘And John McVie wants you six feet under?’

‘And my son. There’s no way Pete’s going to be released, you see.’

‘But Mullen, he’s a hostage...’

‘Grow up, Pearce. This outfit consists of the most ruthless bunch I met in nine years of service on this frontier. There’s Sam McVie, a bastard who’d murder his mom for a dollar. There’s Barero the Mex, a slimy cheating killer, and there’s some giant character name of Grip, who could take on three men in a fight and win. All these, then John himself, a man so cold he’s known as the Iceman in parts of his territory. He has no... no feelings at all, to my knowledge.’

Dan Mullen looked towards the horizon. There was a heat-haze. The bluffs looked like some orange ship steaming through a dirt-brown sea. ‘Let’s step on, Pearce.’

‘Yeah...... Mullen... I can feel eyes watching me. You feel them?’

‘I’m just happy they ain’t nuthin’ that can spoil my thoughts.’

Dan was gratified that Pearce was quiet after that. Maybe at least one opinion of Dan Mullen was starting to change for the better, he thought.

Dan just knew he had to think of something. He was riding into a lawless place, with his son holed up in there somewhere, and just one man to help him - a storekeeper. In his pocket, he felt the tin star. Even to sense the shape there, pressing against his thigh, was enough to bring back the sensation of having that token of being somebody, being worth something, on his chest.

But he’d throw the thing into the dust if he could know that he would be riding home with his son from this God-forsaken place. To fail was not even a distant nag.

If he could bring his boy back, what did the star matter, he thought to himself.

*

The heat in Broken Sword Canyon was intense. Anything that moved had gone for cover, and as far as any human life was concerned, the day was best given over to a
siesta
. But in their familiar hide-away, the McVies were restless. They tried to kill time in any way that came to mind.

The few birds of prey that still needed to quell some hunger circled overhead. Each

precious inch of shadow was used by something. Nothing lived long out here. Just to breathe was often the most demanding job of the day.

Everything seemed bored. Even the breeze seemed, to the lawless men in the dark,

an annoyance rather than a welcome relief from the strong heat. But something had to be done to kill some time. Just as the lizards forced themselves to shift a few feet in a hunt for a juicy insect, so the desperate men in their nest stretched and yawned into

a mundane, dragging activity. It was going to be one of the longest days ever out there in the God-forsaken place.

*

Barero kept fingering his gun, pacing up and down and looking out across the plain. Sam and Grip played cards, using a barrel as a table. John McVie himself was so sick of his own company that he brought the two hostages out to talk to. Sara was sullen, and she wouldn’t look him in the eye. Pete was eager to play any mind-games he could if it meant talking his way into slipping into that massive cavern. He knew that the chances were that there was a way out, or a place to fight from, if it came to it. There were certainly weapons. As McVie looked him up and down and asked probing questions, half Pete’s mind was scheming, watching, and was half-way to hatching some sort of plan.

This killer McVie was keen to know a lot about Pete’s father. It was like being grilled by a Ranger. John McVie picked his teeth. He had eaten a good, solid breakfast and was relaxed, unlike his men. His long legs stretched to a sack of meal and his hands were behind his head, supporting his neck. His blue eyes glistened like jewels in that permanently shady spot.

‘Now, Peter... if I may call you that... I want you to tell me something. See, I’m curious about your pop. Seems him and me don’t quite hit it off. We did once, mind, but then he sort of offended me.’

‘What did he do?’

‘Never mind. What sort of a man is he, your pa?’

‘A fine man. Quiet, decent. He works hard.’

‘Why, now, I think I caught ya in a untruth. Us Texas fellers, we kin smell a untruth from a mile, right, Sammy?’

‘Whatever you say, big brother.’

‘Now... I heard that your pa was out of a job. Somethin’ about lettin’ the peace-lovin’ folk of Red Ridge down in the shit.’

‘You heard wrong,’ Pete was working hard to control himself. His hands were free now. So were Sara’s, as there was nowhere to run to.

‘Well now, you said he
works
hard.’

‘He does... works at getting back the star. Or some respect at least. I think he’s earned it. Folk say he’s a coward but...’ Pete realised that he had said too much.

McVie sat up and chuckled with delight. ‘Hey, hear that boys? Old Daniel there... he’s real bad spoken of... yeah! Seems folk question his courage! Disgustin’ rumours.’

They all laughed, except Barero. He spat in the dust and then looked to the horizon again. He was yearning for some action, anything to get him out of that little space.

‘Well, my father’s worth ten of you, McVie!’ Pete said, his temper rising.

‘Son, let me educate you. Grip... get us some of that repulsive snake-juice you call coffee... give the kids some.’

Sara spat out her first words of the day. ‘We are NOT kids!’

‘Ooooh, touchy. Real touchy. Filippo Barero loves ladies with an edge on ‘em, right?’

Barero was miles away and didn’t hear.

Pete urged Sara to take some coffee. She hadn’t eaten the porridge at breakfast. He was worried about her. His hugs and soft words were fine, but she had to eat, and she was still grieving intensely. ‘Drink... take it easy.’ Pete whispered.

‘So, this is cosy. Coffee and talk. Now, about your pa, the good sheriff. Was, that is. Now, this Dan Mullen, before you was nothing more than three feet high, used to drive for Fargo. He was pretty good at that line of work, to tell true. But he wouldn’t co-operate in my ... my
business
, so we fell out.’

Pete almost spilled his hot coffee. ‘You mean he was your
friend
?

‘Nope... never a friend, a business partner. Could have been, anyways. But he turned the offer down. All we asked for was some looking-the-other way when we collected a few items. He wouldn’t turn the other way. We had to arrange for him to leave his occupation... hey Sam?’

They laughed and made remarks about Dan’s driving and stage work. But then John’s face turned sour. ‘Yet, you see... he turned lawman. Took the star to support your good self and that perdy wife o’ his.... what was her name now, I can’t recall?’

‘Mary. Her name was Mary.’

Sara squeezed Pete’s arm. She knew he had a letter written by his mother in his pocket, and a necklace of hers which he always had with him.