Apache Ambush

19

It was said Apaches were not quite human. It was said they were savage and merciless. The only good Apache was a dead Apache was another common saying, but the whites who said that usually applied it to all Indians.

It was said Apaches were ghosts. That they could appear and disappear at will. That when they struck, they struck out of nowhere, and then vanished before anyone could lay a hand on them.

The truth of the matter was that Apaches really could appear and disappear at will. When they struck, they did strike out of nowhere. And they invariably vanished before anyone could lay a hand on them.

But they were not ghosts. They were human. They were warriors as tough as the land they roamed. They were men as hard as men could be, and if they seemed ghostlike, it was due to abilities they honed from an early age. Remarkable abilities, such as being able to cover seventy miles on foot without tiring. Or to move in complete silence. Or to kill in the blink of an eye.

Another of their abilities had to do with their vanishing into thin air, as it so often seemed.

Fargo had seen it demonstrated once by an Apache scout at a fort. The colonel in charge thought it wise for his new troops to know what they were up against so he had asked the scout to show them.

Simply put, an Apache could hide himself in virtually any terrain in a span of seconds. A small bush, a small boulder, a log, objects that did not look big enough to hide a kitten, could hide an Apache. If no cover was handy, they would scoop shallow holes into which they swiftly curled and then covered themselves with the dirt they had scooped. To the casual eye, the ground appeared to be as it should be. But when a hapless white happened by, up sprang the Apache.

So when Fraco and the three Apaches disappeared, Fargo knew the terrible truth. Dread seized him. He studied the open ground on both sides of the rutted road and noticed little things he had not paid much attention to before. Swirls in the dirt where there should not be swirls. Bumps where there should not be bumps. Bushes that were darker than they should be because the sun passing through them was blocked by something on the other side.

‘‘Hell.’’

Stack laughed at that. ‘‘Just caught on, didn’t you? And you are supposed to be so sharp.’’

Fargo simmered but said nothing.

‘‘There will be a lot of dead here shortly,’’ Stack said smugly. He shifted in the saddle toward the trees to the south, and waved.

A rider appeared. On either side of him were others, grim men with guns. A heavyset man in the middle returned the gesture.

The riders were all white.

The heavyset man wore a wide-brimmed straw hat and city clothes more fit for the opera than range riding. A gold ring on his finger flashed in the sunlight. A watch chain adorned his vest.

‘‘Who?’’ Fargo asked as they melted back into the vegetation.

‘‘That would be the great Jefferson Grind himself,’’ Stack said. ‘‘At least he is great in his own mind if no one else’s.’’

‘‘You don’t seem to think highly of the gent who hired you,’’ Fargo brought up.

‘‘There is no ‘seem’ to it,’’ Stack said. ‘‘He is a pig. But he is a pig who is paying me a lot of money so I will keep the pig comments to myself.’’

‘‘If you work for a pig, what does that make you?’’

Stack colored and leaned on his saddle horn. ‘‘I do what he pays me to do and that is it.’’

Fargo was curious. ‘‘The other day when you offered to help me hunt down Fraco, you came along to make sure I didn’t catch him.’’

Stack nodded.

‘‘And last night when we were crawling around, you helped to make sure all the Apaches had gone off as they were supposed to?’’

‘‘You are slow but you catch on.’’

‘‘And those four men, Wilson and Becker and the others—?’’

‘‘They were on their way to meet with me.’’ Stack gazed to the east and cocked his head, listening. ‘‘I wanted to put a bullet or two into Cranmeyer but Grind insists on doing that himself.’’

‘‘You were slick,’’ Fargo admitted.

‘‘I am paid to be.’’

‘‘There was something about you that didn’t sit right,’’ Fargo said. ‘‘Something at the back of my mind that warned me I couldn’t trust you. But I didn’t listen.’’

‘‘We should always trust our instincts,’’ Stack said. ‘‘They keep our hair on our heads and our breath in our lungs.’’ He cocked his head again. ‘‘Do you hear that?’’

Fargo had been hearing it for some time; the creak and rattle of heavy wagons, the clomp of hooves and voices. The wagon train was climbing the last grade to the top of the ridge. It would not be long before the first of the wagons rumbled into view.

Fargo thought fast. He had mere minutes in which to thwart Jefferson Grind. But what could he hope to do when he was one against so many? How could he warn Cranmeyer without sacrificing his own life?

Stack was enormously pleased with himself. ‘‘I will make more money from this one job than I made all last year.’’

‘‘Good for you.’’

‘‘After this is over I think I will drift down Mexico way,’’ Stack said. ‘‘Find me a cantina somewhere, with a pretty senorita, and spend a month or two drinking tequila. How does that sound?’’

Fargo had an inspiration. It was not much, as inspirations went, but it was all he could think of. ‘‘You are scum,’’ he said.

‘‘Now, now,’’ Stack scolded, as if Fargo were ten. ‘‘There is no call for talk like that.’’

‘‘You are scum through and through.’’ Fargo expanded on his insult. ‘‘At least the Apaches have an excuse for the killing they do. You don’t have any. You are a weasel with a fancy revolver, nothing more.’’

‘‘I am warning you,’’ Stack said, glaring. ‘‘You do not want to make me mad.’’

‘‘We are known by the company we keep, and you keep the company of a pig like Jefferson Grind and a bastard like Fraco.’’

Stack raised the Remington. ‘‘Damn you.’’

‘‘Go ahead. Pull the trigger on that smoke wagon,’’ Fargo taunted. ‘‘I am unarmed. It should be easy for a coward.’’

‘‘I’m not yellow!’’ Stack practically shouted. Too late, he realized what he had done, and stiffened. With an oath he glanced toward where the road came over the ridge.

The point riders and the first wagon had appeared.

Cranmeyer and Krupp were out in front with several guards, and had drawn rein in puzzlement.

Stack jerked his revolver down, and swore. He was so mad, he gnashed his teeth. ‘‘You tricky son of a bitch.’’

Not tricky enough, Fargo thought. He had given Cranmeyer the idea that something was wrong, and the train had stopped. But now what? How could he save the drivers and guards? To say nothing of the Frazier sisters. The answer was obvious; he couldn’t. No matter what he did, Grind and the Apaches would attack. The best he could do, the best he could hope for, was to warn them so they had a few precious seconds in which to bring their weapons to bear. Those seconds might make all the difference.

Fargo smiled at Stack. ‘‘Is it true your mother was a whore?’’

‘‘What?’’

‘‘Is it true she slept with half the Fifth Cavalry and you don’t know who your father was?’’

Stack blinked. ‘‘What the hell are you up to?’’ He did not wait for an answer. ‘‘Let me guess. You are trying to provoke me. You want me good and mad so I will shoot you or hit you. But it won’t work. I am not ten years old. Cranmeyer will not catch on that something is wrong.’’

‘‘He already has,’’ Fargo said, and nodded.

Krupp was riding toward them, all six feet plus and two hundred pounds or more of him. His right hand rested on the butt of his Colt, and he kept glancing from Fargo to Stack and back again. Ten feet from them he drew rein. ‘‘What is going on here?’’ he demanded.

‘‘Why didn’t Cranmeyer come with you?’’ Stack asked.

‘‘I told him not to,’’ Krupp said.

‘‘You told him?’’ Stack said. ‘‘Since when do you give him orders? He is the boss.’’

‘‘You forget I am the captain of his freight train. I see to it that no harm comes to him.’’

‘‘Oh, you do, do you?’’ Stack sounded amused.

Krupp nodded. ‘‘Because I am big, some folks seem to think that must mean I am slow. But I am not slow. I just don’t say a lot. I keep my own peace.’’

Fargo wanted to warn him. But Stack was holding the pearl-handled Remington close to his leg, and all Stack had to do was angle the barrel and squeeze the trigger.

‘‘What are you getting at?’’ the killer snapped at the captain.

‘‘I give the orders and I ask the questions,’’ Krupp said. ‘‘And I will ask you again. What is going on here?’’

‘‘This is a good spot to noon,’’ Stack said. ‘‘We have been waiting for you, is all.’’

‘‘Why is your six-shooter out?’’

Stack shrugged. ‘‘This is Apache country. A man doesn’t need any more reason than that, does he?’’

‘‘I suppose not.’’ Krupp started to wheel his bay but stopped with the animal broadside to them. His right arm, Fargo noticed, was screened by his body. ‘‘What about the other one?’’

‘‘Eh?’’ Stack said.

‘‘Fargo’s six-shooter,’’ Krupp said. ‘‘His holster is empty. What happened to his revolver?’’

Fargo almost told him that an Apache had taken it, but Stack responded first.

‘‘How the hell should I know? You ask a lot of damn fool questions.’’ Stack looked toward the woods that hid Jefferson Grind and his men, then at the seemingly open ground that hid Fraco and the Mimbres Apaches. ‘‘Holler to Cranmeyer and tell him to bring the wagons up.’’

‘‘Did you know I was in the army?’’ Krupp asked.

It was Stack’s day for saying, ‘‘What?’’

‘‘I was in the army before I came to work for Mr. Cranmeyer. A sergeant in the infantry.’’ Krupp smiled in fond recollection. ‘‘I liked military life, liked it a lot.’’

‘‘I do not care,’’ Stack said.

‘‘You will in a minute,’’ Krupp assured him. ‘‘You see, Mr. Cranmeyer needed a captain for his freight trains. He needed someone who can organize things so they run smoothly. Someone used to giving orders. Someone who can handle men and drill them the way the army does.’’

‘‘And he picked you? How wonderful,’’ Stack said with deliberate scorn. ‘‘But what does any of that have to do with anything?’’

‘‘I make a good captain because I was a good sergeant, ’’ Krupp said. ‘‘I was good with the men under me. I learned which ones I could depend on and which ones I couldn’t. Which ones I could trust and which ones were liable to turn tail in a fight.’’ He paused. ‘‘I have never trusted you. Not from the moment you hired on with us until now.’’

Stack grew rigid with wariness. ‘‘Why bring that up all of a sudden?’’ he asked suspiciously.

‘‘I want you to understand,’’ Krupp said.

‘‘Understand what?’’ Stack impatiently snapped.

‘‘I want you to understand that you did not pull the wool over my eyes,’’ Krupp said. ‘‘I want you to understand why I killed you.’’ And with that, his right hand rose and in it was his Colt.

Stack was ungodly quick. He leveled the Remington and snapped off a shot first.

Krupp jerked, and fired. He had been hit but he got off a shot and he did not shoot for the chest as Stack had done; he shot Stack in the head. Even as he squeezed the trigger he slapped those big legs of his against his bay and bawled, ‘‘Ride, Fargo! Ride!’’

Fargo did not need encouragement. A bellow of rage had risen from the trees and the earth was sprouting Apaches as if they were cornstalks. He used his spurs and bent low and was glad he had when an arrow cleaved the air above him. Only then did he realize that Cranmeyer and the men who had been with him were nowhere to been seen. They had gone back down the ridge. The first wagon was still there, parked so it blocked the road, but the driver and the wagon guard were not in it.

Jefferson Grind and his hired killers were charging from the trees, Grind conspicuous by his straw hat, but they were too far off to keep Fargo and Krupp from getting away.

Not so the Apaches. There had to be twenty warriors on either side, dirt and dust cascading from their bronzed bodies as they rose from concealment. Several were close enough to stop them, and bounded to do so. Others let fly with arrows. Rifles belched lead and smoke.

An arrow embedded itself in Krupp’s bay but the horse kept going. Krupp blasted a Mimbres who sprang at him with a knife.

Fargo had problems of his own. An arrow sliced his shoulder but did not stick. A bullet nicked his hat. A warrior reared in front of him, taking aim with a Sharps, and he rode the Apache down. At the last instant the Mimbres tried to leap aside but the Ovaro bowled him over as if he were a rag doll. Bone crunched and blood splattered, and then Fargo was in the clear and the Ovaro was nose to tail with the bay.

‘‘Kill them!’’ Jefferson Grind roared. ‘‘Kill them all!’’

Fraco shouted something in the Apache tongue.

Yipping in wolfish chorus, the warriors covered the ground in long bounds, swooping to the attack.