[Texas Rangers 04] - Ranger's Trail (22 page)

He found himself in front of the horses again. They were slowing. He shouted until he was hoarse. Gradually they began to mill. Somewhere beyond sight he heard a few more shots, then the night fell quiet except for the nervous stamping of hooves against limestone rocks, the nervous nickering of horses.

He saw a rider coming toward him from the west and brought up his pistol. He lowered it when he recognized Brackett’s voice. “Holler out, Badger Boy.” The man and his horse were both breathing hard. Brackett struggled for breath. “Got them stopped did you? I hope we didn’t lose any.”

Andy said, “I never knew Comanches to give up so easy.”

“
Comanches? Didn’t you get a look at any of them?”

“
It was too dark, and things moved too fast.”

“
If they was Comanches, I’m an Apache squaw. They were as white as me and you. Me, anyway.”

Several rangers came up, riding hard. They had had mounts staked in or near camp. The captain was among them. “What happened here, men?”

Brackett said, “Just had a little company. They didn’t stay long.”

“
Did we lose any horses?”

“
We can’t take a good count ’til daylight. Looks like most of them are still here.”

“
Indians, I suppose?”

“
Not this time. I’m sorry to say it, but there’s some white men near as bad as Comanches.”

The captain accepted the report with a satisfied grunt. “You did good work, Brackett. You too, Pickard.”

Andy said, “Captain, one of them went down back yonder. Private Brackett shot him.”

“
Dead?”

“
I didn’t wait to see, sir. Seemed more important to catch the horses.”

“
We’ll pick him up as we drive the remuda back.”

Andy gritted his teeth. He had rather take a whipping with a wet rope than acknowledge that Brackett had saved his bacon, but he owed it to the man to tell the truth. “My horse got knocked down. That outlaw was fixin’ to kill me. Private Brackett shot him first.”

The captain was pleased. “I’ll put that on your record, Brackett. It might help make you a sergeant one day.”

Brackett said, “I’d’ve done the same thing for the camp cook. Quicker, maybe. He makes good biscuits.”

Tanner and the Morris brothers rode ahead of the horses, looking for the raider Brackett had shot. By the time Andy reached them, they had him. Tanner said, “Looky what we found, Captain, tryin’ to sneak off into the timber. He’s leakin’ some, but he’s breathin’.”

The man was hunched over, holding one arm tightly against his ribs. Andy did not think he had ever seen him before, though a ragged beard covered most of his face except for his frightened eyes.

Tanner said, “We got no jail to put him in.”

Johnny Morris said, “We got plenty of trees to hang him from. What do you say, Captain?”

The man cried out, “Somebody help me. Can’t you see I’m shot?”

The captain’s voice was grave. “You present us with a problem. As Private Morris said, we have no jail to put you in and no doctor to see to your wound. There seems to be but one answer.”

Brackett waved a pistol. “It’s my fault, Captain. I was movin’ fast and in the dark. Couldn’t aim straight. I’ll make up for it right now if you want me to.”

Andy hoped Brackett was just trying to intimidate the prisoner, but he sounded as if he meant it.

The outlaw sank to his knees. “For God’s sake, give me a chance.”

The captain made a show of struggling with his decision. “My better judgment tells me to put an end to it. But I might consider an alternative if you’d cooperate.”

“
Anything. Leave me go and I won’t stop ’til I get to California. Maybe even further.”

“
I’ll want you to identify your confederates and tell me where we might be most likely to find them.”

“
I’ll tell you all I know. They run off and left me. I don’t owe them nothin’.”

The captain pointed his chin at the herd. “Pickard, catch him a horse. He can ride to camp bareback.”

The outlaw cried, “I can’t ride. I been shot. I think my ribs are busted.”

“
A little hurting will help you repent your wayward life.”

Andy doubted that. The only thing this renegade would regret was getting caught. A while earlier he had been willing to murder Andy. Despite his pleas, he was unlikely to reform. He would travel a crooked road until a better-aimed bullet or a strong rope stopped him for good.

The prisoner grunted in pain with almost every step. Andy mustered no sympathy. Leading the horse, he maneuvered it across the roughest ground he could find.

He wouldn’t have lost a minute’s sleep over killing me, he thought. What’s more, he made me beholden to Farley Brackett.

That might have been the worst offense of all.

Brackett eased over beside Andy. “I been mullin’ this thing over. You thought it was Indians, didn’t you?”

Andy wondered what he was driving at. “Thought it might be. I couldn’t see much.”

“
Occurs to me you had a chance to shoot this man before he ran into your horse. Why didn’t you?”

“
I didn’t see him soon enough.”

“
Or maybe you didn’t want to shoot a fellow Comanche.”

Andy’s face warmed. He was glad the darkness kept Brackett from seeing it. He had told the truth about not having time to fire at this raider, but moments earlier he had seen another. He had a few seconds in which he might have fired, but he had hesitated. Brackett was partially right.

He managed a defiant tone. “Believe what you want to.”

“
I try to give a man the benefit of the doubt, the first time. And I’ve damned sure got some doubts about you, Badger Boy.”

“
I suppose you’ll tell the captain about them?”

“
I’ll keep them to myself for now. But I’ll be watchin’ you.”

The prisoner’s horse stumbled on a rock outcrop and almost went down. The man grabbed his side and screeched, “Damn you, can’t you watch where you lead this horse?”

Brackett said, “You’re lucky we ain’t leadin’ him out from under a tree limb and leavin’ you attached to it.”

Andy was grateful that Brackett transfered his malice to the prisoner. He settled into quiet meditation over his own situation. Would he have reacted differently had he known from the first that the horse thieves were white? He was not sure. He feared he might have.

The captain had left a strong guard on the horse herd. At daylight they brought the horses into a clearing at the edge of camp for an accurate count. He and Holloway agreed that they were short only three horses. The thieves might have gotten away with them, or they might simply have strayed away from the main bunch during the excitement. He sent part of the company out on a search for the missing three. Then he watched the cook clean the prisoner’s wound.

The renegade protested over the fact that the cook was black. “I ain’t never let no dirty nigger touch me.”

The captain retorted, “That black won’t rub off on you. Keep at it, Bo.”

The prisoner squalled as the cook poured alcohol into the wound. Bo grinned and poured more. By the time the bandage had been applied and the ribs tightly wrapped, the prisoner had regained some of his lost courage. When the captain began to question him, he refused to answer. “I changed my mind. I ain’t tellin’ you a damned thing.”

“
Regrettable. I hope you realize that if you won’t talk, you’re of no use to us.”

“
Never meant to be.”

The captain nodded gravely at Holloway. “Sergeant, I have a report to write. Would you take charge of the prisoner? See if you can bring him around to our way of thinking.” He retired to his headquarters tent.

Holloway said, “Brackett, bring your rope. We’re takin’ a little walk down to the river.”

The prisoner’s eyes widened. “What’re you fixin’ to do?”

“
Like the captain said, you’re of no use to us, and we’ve got no jail.” He tied the man’s hands behind his back with a rawhide string, then took a firm grip on one arm. Brackett grabbed the other. Though the prisoner dragged his feet, they hustled him along. Andy followed at a short distance, curious.

Holloway pointed at a sturdy pecan limb about ten feet off of the ground. “That one ought to do. Throw your rope over it.”

The prisoner blustered. “You’re tryin’ to bluff me. You wouldn’t do this to a man. It’s against the law.”

Neither Holloway nor Brackett replied. Brackett slipped the loop over the prisoner’s head and tightened it around his neck. He pulled the other end of the rope and took up the slack.

The renegade was sweating but tried to show a brave face. “You won’t really do this. You ain’t allowed.”

Holloway nodded, and Brackett pulled the rope. It drew taut. The prisoner choked as his legs straightened. He bent his toes, trying to keep them touching the ground. Brackett pulled until the prisoner’s feet were clear by a full six inches. Brackett held him there for a bit, then let him down.

“
Got a kink in the rope,” he explained. “Need to straighten it out.”

The prisoner went to his knees, gasping, his face turning purple. Holloway bent over him. “We forgot to ask if you have any last words for the Lord.”

The man coughed but could not speak. Holloway pulled him to his feet. “We’ll get it done right this time. Go ahead, Brackett.”

As the rope tightened the prisoner found voice. “No! No! For God’s sake …”

Holloway seemed unmoved. “Tell me why not.”

“
Get the captain. Ask me anything.”

Holloway appeared disappointed, but he turned and winked at Andy. “Don’t put your rope away, Brackett. We’ll need it if he changes his mind again.”

The prisoner was so limp from terror that it took both men’s support to get him back to the headquarters tent. A heavy smell indicated he had soiled himself. Holloway said, “Captain, I believe he’s come to Jesus.”

The captain emerged from the tent, smiling thinly. “He just needed time to consider the error of his ways.”

When he quit coughing and regained his breath the culprit became a fountain of information. He said four including himself had been involved. They had planned in the excitement to cut off twelve or fifteen horses and get away with them in the darkness while the rangers chased after the main herd. They had hoped the raid would be blamed on Indians.

He rattled off his accomplices’ names without hesitation: Arliss Wilkes, Brewster Pardo, and a boy called Scooter. He didn’t know the boy’s last name.

Holloway flipped through the pages of his fugitive book. “I find everybody in here except the boy.”

The prisoner wailed as the cook rubbed salty bacon grease on his neck, burned red and raw by the rope. The captain told a nearby ranger, “Handcuff him to a chain and lock the chain around a tree. By the time he gets to a real jail he’ll think it’s the Menger Hotel in San Antonio.”

Andy asked Holloway, “Can you do this? Is it legal?”

“
Anything is legal if it works, and if you don’t let the wrong people see it.”

“
Somebody is bound to ask about the mark around his neck.”

“
I’ll just say he wears his collars too tight.”

The captain chose five men to follow after and attempt to apprehend the thieves. They were Andy, Brackett, Tanner, Johnny Morris, and Sergeant Holloway. “Stay on their trail as long as you feel there’s a chance it will be fruitful. Take them alive if it can be done without undue risk to yourselves. Otherwise, shoot to kill. If the rangers are to be respected we must show the outlaw class that we will exact a price for every offense.”

Brackett jerked his head at Andy. “Captain, don’t you think this boy is a little green?” Andy had not once heard him say
sir
.

“
If so, he will ripen with experience.”

By the time the five were prepared to leave, the rangers who had sought the three missing horses returned. One reported, “We found them, Captain. Looks like the thieves didn’t get anything except experience.”

“
With a little luck we’ll give them more of that.”

I
t took some circling and searching before Andy found that the three remaining raiders had rejoined one another a couple of miles west from where they had first jumped the remuda. He waved his hat over his head to draw the attention of the other four rangers. Len Tanner had to be sent out to find Johnny Morris, off on a tangent of his own.

Sergeant Holloway said, “Since you found the trail, Andy, we’ll let you track for a while. If you run up a stump, somebody else’ll take it.”

Tanner said, “I’ll bet there ain’t a better tracker in the company than Andy, unless it’s me.”

Holloway said, “You may get your chance. We’ll see first what Andy can do.”

Andy had not expected so much responsibility so soon. He felt a glow of pride, though he knew Holloway was testing him.