Rio Largo

Chapter 28

John Jesco could not stop the black man from burying the knife in his neck. The black was too strong. With the certainty came action. Rather than continue to pit his sinews in a lost cause, Jesco shifted to one side, and twisted. The blade nicked his neck, leaving a razor-thin red line, and sank into the wall. Before the black could pull the weapon free, Jesco drove his knee between the man’s legs.

The black staggered but did not go down. Recovering, he yanked out the knife and stabbed at Jesco’s chest, but Jesco skipped aside.

Apparently deciding enough was enough, the black man suddenly reversed his grip from the hilt to the blade, and threw the knife at Jesco’s throat. Jesco automatically ducked, and saw that the black was going for his pearl-handled revolvers.

Jesco tackled him, wrapping his arms around the other’s so that the black could not complete his draw. They sprawled on their sides. Jesco swung his right fist at the black’s jaw, swung with all his might, but in the dark, he struck the man’s neck instead. The black man arched upward, his revolvers forgotten as he bucked and gurgled and vainly clutched his crushed throat.

It was hard to say which of them was more surprised. Jesco rolled onto his knees and drew his Colt, but he did not shoot.

The black man made sucking noises. The whites of his eyes showed as he fixed them on Jesco in disbelief. “Not like this!” he croaked. “It can’t be like this!”

But it was. Another minute, and the convulsions stopped. Jesco felt for a pulse and confirmed there was none. He did not feel particularly elated. Whoever the black man was, luck had beaten him, plain and simple luck, not anything special Jesco did. Straightening, he turned toward the front of the house and received yet another unwelcome surprise.

Another man was coming around the front corner. Jesco hunkered down in order not to be seen and watched the skulker slink to the side window. He had a rifle. Rising on the tips of his toes, he pressed his face to the pane.

Jesco had a good shot, but the blast would forewarn the others. There was a better, quieter way. He holstered his Colt, and groped about for the knife. It lay at the base of the wall.

The outlaw was trying to open the window.

It felt strange using a knife. Jesco never carried one, had never killed with a blade until now. He much preferred the crack and buck of his Colt. A slug through the head or the heart was always fatal, but a knife was an iffy proposition, like shooting someone in the guts. Sometimes it killed them outright, and sometimes it didn’t.

Foiled, the outlaw raised his rifle to break the glass.

Jesco was only a few feet away when the man apparently sensed him, and spun. The man started to level his rifle at the same instant Jesco lunged. Steel rang on steel. The blade glanced off the rifle’s barrel, and once again, a fluke favored Jesco. The knife was deflected downward, into the man’s groin. It sliced through his pants and his flesh as if they were not there.

The man bleated and dropped the Winchester. Tottering, he cupped himself, then turned and bolted past the front corner of the house, screeching, “I’ve been stabbed! I’ve been stabbed!”

Jesco sprang to the corner. Stealth was no longer called for. Drawing his Colt, he called out, “Fill your hand!”

To his credit, the man tried. He stopped and turned, his splayed, bloody fingers dropping to his revolver.

Jesco shot him. One was all it took, smack between the eyes. The man’s head whipped back, and he melted to the earth like so much wax. Beyond him, rifles spat flame and thunder. Lead thwacked against the house, and narrowly missed Jesco’s cheek. He replied with thunder of his own, three swift shots, then backpedaled and commenced reloading.

“Surround him! Cut him off!”

The shout and the sight of shadowy forms flitting toward him galvanized Jesco into shoving his Colt into his holster with two cartridges still to be replaced. Spinning, he felt on the ground for the Winchester. Finding it took only a moment. Then, jamming the stock to his shoulder, he centered a hasty bead on an onrushing silhouette, thumbed back the hammer, and applied his finger to the trigger.

The rifle did not go off.

Belatedly, Jesco realized its previous owner had not fed a cartridge into the chamber. He remedied the oversight with a flip of the lever, and banged off the shot. Several rifles cracked in cadence as Jesco dodged around the corner. He felt something fly past him, but his skin was spared.

Jesco had a decision to make. Should he stay and fight it out or stay on the move and make them come to him? The fact he was outnumbered decided the issue. He turned and ran, glancing over his shoulder to ensure he did not take a bullet in the back. He forgot about the dead black, and the oversight proved costly.

Running at full speed, Jesco tripped over the body. He tried to stay upright, but pitched onto his stomach, absorbing most of the fall with his hands. His ankle spiked with pain. He rolled as a rifle blasted, and heard the slug tear into the dead man. Flat on his back, he sought the shooter, but no movement registered.

The night became deathly still.

Jesco slowly sat up, with his back to the house. He set down the rifle, and hastily finished reloading the Colt. It was now a game of cat and mouse. He was unsure how many were left. Definitely three, perhaps four. They would expect him to stay close to the house, so he cautiously made off into the darkness.

Thirty feet out, Jesco squatted. The silence rubbed on his nerves. He would as soon they all came at him at once, to get it over with. The yard, the corral, the stable were deceptively peaceful. He decided to crawl toward the front of the house and provoke them into giving themselves away.

The wavering yip of a coyote reminded Jesco of the world past the buildings. He wondered where Kent Tovey and Clayburn and the rest of the punchers had gotten to, and hoped to heaven they weren’t attacking the DP. Too many lives had already been lost to hatred and greed.

To think that once the two ranches had been like peas in a pod. It said a lot about human nature. About the dark depths that lurked in the hearts of even the innocent and decent. About the dangers of jumping to conclusions, and letting emotion warp reason.

Jesco never considered himself all that savvy, except about cows. He could handle a revolver better than most, but that was the result of practice, not insight. Human nature was pretty much a mystery to him. He wasn’t joking when he told Timmy that the only two certainties in life were being born and dying. The rest was a muddle, a maze of right decisions and wrong decisions and decisions that seemed right at the time, but turned out to be wrong later. The best a person could do was pick a course and stick with it, the rest of the world be hanged.

Jesco had picked his course. He was a cowboy. He would always be a cowboy. A cowboy’s life was not as grand, say, as being president. Riding night herd could not begin to compare to riding herd in the country. Nor was their much money to be had. The few cowmen who became rich were the exceptions, not the rule. But cows were what Jesco liked, and cows would do him until his turn came to be planted. Which he hoped was later rather than sooner.

A sound snapped Jesco to the here and now. He stopped and listened, and presently the sound was repeated—a stealthy scrape and soft rustle, as if someone was crawling through the grass . . . in his direction. Lowering his chin to the ground, he waited. Soon, heavy breathing testified to the other’s exertions. Whoever it was, he was making enough noise for two or three men.

Jesco thought it had to be a ruse. No one would deliberately be so loud. Then it hit him, who the crawler must be. Silently setting the Winchester at his side, he drew his Colt, his thumb on the hammer.

The seconds passed on tortoise feet. Then the grass parted, framing a thin face. In the man’s left hand was a rifle, which he was holding by the barrel. He crawled another foot or so, and stopped in surprise. “Fritz, is that you?” he whispered.

“No, it isn’t,” Jesco said, and cocked the Colt.

“You!” the man let go of his rifle and thrust his hand out in fear. “Don’t shoot, mister! For God’s sake, haven’t you done enough to me? I may be crippled for life.”

It was the outlaw Jesco had shot in the legs with the shotgun. “If you’re lookin’ for sympathy, you’re barkin’ up the wrong tree. You were tryin’ to burn the house down, and me along with it.”

The man defended the deed. “I was only doin’ what I was told. Besides, you stopped us. No harm done, except to me and Lutt.” He licked his lips. “Everyone calls me Harvey.”

Jesco scoured their vicinity, but did not spot anyone else. “You can try with the rifle or a six-shooter if you have one.”

“Please, mister. I’m hurtin’, hurtin’ powerful bad.” Harvey’s fear was thick enough to cut with a blunt table knife.

“Whenever you’re ready.”

“God Almighty.” Harvey rose on his elbows and looked about him. “All I want is to leave this place alive.” And just like that, he threw back his head and bawled, “Saber! Over here!” Simultaneously, he grabbed his rifle and swung the muzzle up. He almost made it.

Jesco cored him through the forehead. The blast had not yet faded when Jesco sprang into motion. Holstering his Colt, he rolled to his feet, snagged the rifle on the move, and flew toward the house. It occurred to him that he should check on Timmy. Something had gone wrong with their plan; the rustlers had never opened fire on Dunn’s body.

A shape hove up out of nowhere and a rifle boomed. Jesco returned the favor, emptying the Winchester, and it was the shape that crumpled, not him. He ran on, to the same side window he had slipped out of. It was open a few inches, and he was sure he had closed it. Worry lanced through him. He opened it high enough to hook his leg over the sill.

“Timmy?” Jesco whispered in the stillness of the room. The Colt firmly in hand, his elbow molded to his side, Jesco crept down the hall to the parlor. By then his eyes had adjusted. The first thing he saw was the overturned chair, and what appeared to be two bodies intertwined beside it. He took a bound, and was brought up short by the abrupt blaze of a lamp.

From behind the settee rose a lanky man in a buckskin jacket. He was holding the lamp. In his other hand was a Colt, pointed not at Jesco, but at one of the two sprawled figures on the floor.

Another man came out of the shadows near the front curtains. He had feral features and a vivid scar down the right side of his face. His Colt, too, was trained on one of the figures. “Do anything hasty, cowboy, and we give your young friend a new set of ear holes.”

Timmy was pinned under Dunn, his arms outspread, completely helpless. “Sorry,” he said.

“How in the world?” Jesco exclaimed, relieved to find him alive. Then, to the man with the scar, “Let me guess. You’re Saber.”

“What gave you the clue?” The outlaw leader nodded at the window. “I heard a lot of shootin’ out there. My other lunkheads?”

“Won’t be stealin’ any cows.”

“Damn.”

“Your scheme has failed,” Jesco told him. “There’s only the two of you left.”

The man holding the lamp snickered. “That’s what you think, mister. There’s still Hijino. By now he’s probably wiped out the Pierces.”

Saber glowered hotly. “Shut your mouth, damn it, Twitch. You talk too much. You always have.”

“Two or three, it doesn’t matter,” Jesco said. “There’s not enough of you to steal the herds.”

“Not now, no,” Saber said. “But those critters aren’t goin’ anywhere. I can send out word and in two or three weeks have enough men to replace those you’ve turned into maggot bait, plus extra.” A smug smile curled his scar. “All you’ve done is delay things a mite.”

Twitch raised the lamp higher. “We have you over a barrel,” he gloated. “Drop that smoke wagon, or else.”

Jesco looked at Timmy. If he set the Colt down, they were as good as goners. So long as he held onto it, they had a prayer. “No.”

“We’ll plug him,” Twitch threatened. “Me or Saber, one or the other. So help me.”

“Go ahead,” Jesco said, sidling to the left so he could watch both of them without having to turn his head.

“What?” Both Twitch and Timmy declared in disbelief, with Twitch going on, “You don’t care if we bed him down permanent?”

Saber swore luridly. “Of course he cares. But he’s got more grit than I gave him credit for.”

“I’ll shoot the first one of you who fires,” Jesco vowed. He was tense from head to toe with apprehension over what he had to do.

“We have us a standoff,” Saber said. “It’s what I get for thinkin’ this cowboy was no different from any other.”

“I’m just a puncher,” Jesco said to keep them talking. He was staring at them, but he was seeing the arroyo, and the scores of broken bottles. All that practice was about to pay off, or get him and Timmy killed.

“No cowpoke could do what you’ve done,” Saber said. “I always figured my boys were a match for fifty of your kind.”

“You figured wrong,” Jesco said, and shot him in the chest. Quick as thought, he shifted and fanned off two shots at Twitch’s face. Twitch’s right eye exploded, and his nose spouted crimson. In the same split second, another shot banged, and a slug dug across Jesco’s ribs.

Saber was still on his feet. “You’re mine!” he roared.

They fired simultaneously. It was Jesco who went on firing, fanning his Colt until it was empty.

Tendrils of gun smoke hung thick in the air. The thrashing and mewing ended, and as Jesco reloaded, he walked over to the bodies and nudged them to be certain.

“What about me?” Timmy impatiently asked.

Jesco twirled the Colt into his holster, and grinned. “I should leave you there. The boys can use a good laugh when they get back.”

Timmy Loring had learned a lot of cuss words at the Circle T.