The Copper City (6 page)

“We had a bottle last night,” Pete said edgily. He pointed to the empty on the table.

“
Hombre, suyo compadre
, the man your friend.” She mimed a man peeking down the front of her dress.

Pete couldn't work it out. “What in hell's she talking about?”

“She says Upton brought the whiskey in with him. That proves it.” He looked at the woman again. “
Dos
, two, tequilas.” She poured two shots. It went down in one gulp, burning like a river of molten lava, but it seemed to do some good.

“The bank,” Quantro said, stalking back to the table to pick up his Winchester.

It was past opening time but there weren't many customers.

Judging by the state of most of the people out on the street, Quantro supposed they didn't have enough money left over from staying alive to entrust to the bank. He went directly to the counter. “The manager,
pronto
.”

The clerk looked at Quantro. He saw a raw-eyed, grizzle-jawed man with long blond hair hanging lankly at his shoulders. In his hands was a rifle that looked as though it had been used frequently. It looked like a hold-up. He blinked, frightened, eyes like bulls eyes behind his wire-rimmed spectacles.

“
Si, Señor
, I will fetch.” He scurried away through a door at the rear. When he returned it was with a tall, thin man who had a hooknose and slicked-back hair. He strode importantly toward them, the pants of his baggy pinstripe suit flapping around his legs. In his hand was a gun. This one wasn't frightened. He stopped at the counter, the gun resting squarely at Quantro's stomach, ready to do business. When the clerk hovered nervously, he waved him away.

“Yes, gentlemen? Can I be of service?” There was barely a trace of native Mexican in his voice.

“For openers you can put down the gun,” Quantro said.

The manager looked down at his pistol as though unaware it had been there in his hand all the time. He motioned with it to Quantro's rifle. “Only if you return the compliment.”

Quantro put the Winchester on the counter. The manager smiled and holstered his pistol, inside his jacket. No wonder the suit's baggy, Quantro thought, I wonder what he's got inside those pants. A shotgun?

“We're from the Cananea Copper Company. We're here to pick up the silver shipment.”

The manager gave little away. “How am I to know that? You come in here like bandits, waving guns and terrorizing my staff.”

“You'd better believe it,” Quantro said. “We came into town with a man called Upton. He carried the authority to pick it up.”

“Yes?”

Quantro sighed. “Look, as soon as I find out what's happened here, I'm going to go over to the telegraph office and notify Mr. William Green that his shipment of silver to pay the miners has been stolen by a certain Mr. Upton. If you don't believe we're from the company, you can come over yourself and check us out. A Mr. Harley in Cananea will verify who we are. My name is Quantro and this is Mr. Wiltshire. We're personal guards to Mr. Harley.”

The manager studied Quantro for a moment, then decided he was genuine. “In that case you are a little late. The shipment was loaded at dawn this morning. I supervised it myself. They will be well away by now.”

“That's what we figured. You saw a note of authority?”

“Yes. Mr. Upton carried it.” The manager shrugged. “He has been here several times before.”

“I bet he has. How many men were there?”

“Four.”

“Transport? How was the silver loaded?”

“It was packed in bullion boxes and loaded on a buckboard.”

“It all went off according to schedule?”

“Yes. As I told you, Mr. Upton had the necessary authority and I was justified in turning the shipment over to him.”

“I know. Nobody's blaming you.” Quantro turned to Pete. “Let's go send that wire.”

Upton Taken Off With Shipment + Stop + Hulbert Dead + Stop + We Are In Pursuit + Stop + Quantro and Wiltshire + Stop + Santa Cruz + Stop

“That ought to do it,” Quantro said, passing the slip back over the counter. “Send it right now.” The clerk nodded.

“What does ‘in pursuit' mean?” Pete asked as they pushed out into the sunlight.

“It means we're following them.”

“That's what I figured,” Pete said glumly.

Quantro unhitched the buckskin and swung up into the saddle. When Pete was mounted, they wheeled to ride down the street toward Cananea. “Say it, Pete,” he prompted.

Pete scowled. “There's no chance. They'll be clear to the border by now.”

“Maybe so, but we gotta do it.”

“Then we're headed the wrong way. The border's in the other direction.”

“Yes, but they'll have gone out of town this way, then circled around. If we went the other way to save time, we'd just lose what we'd gained by having to cast for their sign.” He grinned when Pete made a face, then spurred the big stallion. By the time Pete caught up they were almost at the end of the street, faced by the open country.

“Anyhow, why are we doing this? Why don't we just go back to Cananea and hand the problem to Harley? It's the company's money, not ours.”

“We gotta do it, that's all.”

Pete nudged his pony's ribs so that it kept pace with the prancing buckskin. “That's a mighty fine attitude. Loyalty to the company. Mighty fine.”

Quantro shook his head, his eyes already raking the terrain ahead. “Not at all. I've no loyalty to the company.”

“Not one little piece?”

“No.”

“Why then?”

“Harley promised us a thirty-dollar bonus.”

“Is thirty dollars worth a ride clear to the border just to lose them and have to turn back empty-handed?”

“There'll be more than thirty bucks in it by the time we've caught them up.”

“What makes you so sure we will?”

“I know, that's all. I know.”

Pete studied Quantro's set jaw and the long blond hair blown off the gaunt face by the hot desert wind. Somehow he had the feeling that Quantro would catch them.

And Pete wanted to be there to see it.

CHAPTER 6

Santa Cruz nestles in the southernmost tip of the Huachuca Mountains that stretch up to Arizona. It is all of twenty miles to the border if a straight line is drawn across the map. In reality, it is a whole lot farther.

They followed the Cananea trail out of town, Quantro taking the north side, scouring the well-churned ground for the point where Upton and his men had split away.

It was an hour before he found it.

“Hold up, Pete.” Quantro pulled the buckskin to a halt and slid to the ground. His fingers probed the wheel ruts and hoof prints. As well as testing the firmness of the tracks, he looked for insect trails running across them.

“They're moving fast. And that's one heavy wagon. Look at the depth of the ruts.”

“Soon tire out the team.”

Quantro scowled as he remounted. “You can bet if Upton had another two men ready, then they'll have fresh horses stashed some place up ahead. We'll be the ones riding blown horses.”

“Better haul up on them mighty quick, then.”

“I'll allow that makes sense. But if they figure we're following and they know we've got to catch up before they change horses, they could be waiting to blow us away.”

“A set-up?”

Quantro gazed thoughtfully ahead. “We could ride right into it.”

“We got to move fast so we can catch 'em before they get lost on the other side of the border.”

“Patience,” Quantro counseled.

Pete snorted. “Patience and we've lost 'em.”

Quantro shot him a hard look. “No patience and you're dead.”

***

“You think they've found them yet?” Dobey asked, twisting in his saddle to look at their back trail.

“Naw,” Upton replied, squinting ahead at the scrub covered hills.

“But you're sure we're being followed?”

“I can feel it.” Upton rubbed a hand across the back of his neck as though unseen eyes had burned his skin.

“A posse?”

“Naw. Quantro and that old coot who rides with him.”

“Why them? Maybe when they found out we'd already taken the shipment they headed on back for Cananea.”

Upton shook his head. “Naw. That Quantro's different. He can add up what's happening. I'm beginning to wish I stuck a knife into him out in the alley when I killed Hulbert.”

“I figured Hulbert was okay.”

“I'd already planned for Jeffers and Webster here to join up with us. Splitting it five ways would have been too generous. Four's just right.” He grinned slyly, then winked slowly. “Anyhow, we might lose these two along the trail somewhere. You and me, that's one lot of money between the two of us, ain't it?”

Dobey smiled. Yes, Upton was right, but he still disagreed with him killing Buck Hulbert. And just because Hulbert had passed some remark about that Mexican woman. Hulbert had been right too, she had been the ugliest looking female south of the border. Fact was, Dobey had seen prettier looking steers. When they got over the border now, things would be different. There would be fine-looking, no, beautiful women. With that kind of money they could buy all the women they could ever want. And it would take a man some time to get used to the idea.

And he was going to enjoy getting used to it.

Upton had fallen back into his customary silence. The way he figured it, a man would have to be plain foolish to waste his energy just by talking under this hot sun. So he retreated into his thoughts.

Quantro worried him more than he cared to admit to Dobey. As soon as Harley had taken Quantro and Wiltshire on to the payroll, he had made it his business to find out what there was to know about them. Wiltshire was an open book. A few drinks and his whole history came out. A two-bit prospector, searching for a dream until his head was busted in by
banditos
by the waters of the Escondido. After being rescued, he had been living with Apaches in the mountains of the Sierra Madre until he met Quantro.

Quantro was a different case altogether. A man hunter. Two years of tracking four men doggedly across as many territories until he caught up with each of them and paid them out in full. It made him a man to watch. Dangerous and patient. A deadly combination. Upton wished to God he had taken him out of the game back in Santa Cruz. He hadn't wanted Quantro or Wiltshire along on the trip in the first place, but the three other men had made the journey before and Upton had feared they had figured his plan out. It had been easy to spike their food so they went down with food poisoning. He hadn't figured on Harley picking Quantro and Wiltshire to replace them. He had hoped they wouldn't be so fast to catch on to what was happening. Now he wasn't quite sure. They had both seemed to be watching him extra carefully before he'd sent over Hulbert with the doped whiskey.

He checked the sun. One thing, if they were after him, they'd both have heads as sore as bears. He could only hope that would slow them down.

***

“It make any sense to you?” Pete asked, one leg hooked around the saddle horn of his motionless pony. On the ground in front of him, Quantro was casting back and forth across a mess of sign. Occasionally he frowned and stooped for a closer look.

When he got no answer, Pete started to roll up a cigarette. His head still ached fiercely and his mouth tasted like the bottom of a buffalo wallow and he didn't really want the cigarette anyway, but what else was there to do? As he completed his task and placed it between his dust-caked lips, Quantro straightened up. He backed off from the sign and circled toward a thicket.

Cautiously, his Winchester at the ready, he trod warily over the dusty ground. Now Pete was attentive, the cigarette dangling unlit. He slid his rifle from the saddle boot and rested it across the horse's neck.

Quantro grabbed an armload of brush and tugged it loose. When it came away he dumped it on the ground and took hold of another lump. That came away too, then another and another.

“What is it?” Pete called softly, pulling down his hat brim to shade his eyes.

“The buckboard.”

Now he mentioned it, Pete could make out the shape as it emerged from its camouflage.

“I'd worked it out from the sign that they'd switched to packhorses, but I needed to see it.” Quantro clucked his tongue and the buckskin left Pete's side to plod over to its master. Pete rode over as Quantro climbed back into the saddle.

“They've broken the silver out into saddlebags,” Quantro said, indicating the smashed bullion boxes scattered in the wagon bed of the abandoned buckboard. “Four men, four horses and four packhorses, I figure. I don't know how big that much silver looks at one go. Maybe they even had to bury some.”

“You want to take a look-see?”

“Not right now. It doesn't matter. If it's not all there when we catch up with them, we can always come back here.” He gazed expressionlessly over the wild land and Pete knew he was fixing landmarks in his mind, just in case they
did
need to come back.

“Nobody will find it here. Only us.”

“Which way they headed?”

“North.”

“How far are we behind 'em?”

“Two, maybe two and a half hours. Breaking open the boxes'll have slowed them down, but now they've got the packhorses they can cover rougher ground, no fears about busting wheels. So now they'll head directly where they're going, and they'll be getting there faster.”

“You reckon they'll keep on the trail after dark?”

“Yes, and so will we.” He looked at the cloudless sky. “Long as the moon's up. Only time we'll stop is when we lose the sign.” He glanced across at the cigarette still hanging from Pete's lips. “You going to light that thing?”

Pete frowned, then plucked the forgotten cigarette from his mouth and looked at it with distaste. “Hell, no, I don't think I will.”

“Well, pass it over here, then.”

Pete held it out.

“You got a match?”

Pete sighed. “You got anything?”

Quantro ignored him, leaning over to reach the flame. He drew down a lungful of smoke. “Yes, I've got something. “

“What?”

Quantro grinned. “A good nose for tracking bad men.”

***

Upton loosened the saddle-cinch two notches, standing by his horse as it stretched down to drink from the pool. He had slaked his own thirst and his refilled canteen was back on the saddle horn. The day was cooling fast and his shirt was growing stiff with dried sweat. They had ridden hard, not even halting at noon.

As he waited for his horse to finish, he cast an eye over the pack animals waiting in line for their turn to water. They didn't look good. The silver, transferred from the bullion boxes to their saddles was too much for them. They'd last longer if there were one or two more animals to share the load. His gaze drifted to Jeffers and Webster. Maybe, with their horses…

“How far to the border, d'you reckon?”

Upton's train of speculation broke and he turned to see Dobey next to him, rubbing a wet bandana through the trail dust caked into his face. “Five or six miles. Not much further.”

“We going to make camp here?”

“Naw. We'll just water the horses, then walk them for a while and push on through the night. If anyone is trailing us, we'll be in Arizona by midnight.”

“We been thinking about that,” Jeffers interrupted, squeezing between the crowded horses in the narrow canyon. “If this Quantro feller you keep talkin' about is following, well, he ain't the law of any kind, is he?”

Upton shook his head.

“Well, then, it don't matter a damn whether we cross the border or not. That ain't gonna stop him.”

Upton squinted. “You tryin' to say something?”

Jeffers drew back his shoulders as if to emphasize his height and strength. “Me and Webster figure why cross the border? None of the Mexicans are after us. No posses. You had the note of authority to take the money from the bank, all legal like. So there's only this Quantro feller to think about. What will he figure on us doing? Crossing the border, that's what.” He smiled smugly at his logic. “So me and Jimmy here, we got to thinking. Why don't we just head on out to Nogales, or even better, Sasabe. Let him go bustin' his ass looking for us all over the territories and we'll be sitting comfortable, getting drunk, and fighting off the women in Mexico.”

Upton spat into the dust, then put his hands on his hips and nodded slowly. “That's quite a pretty speech, Jeffers. I don't think I've heard you string more than five words together in all the time I've known you. Not bad. Not bad at all.”

Jeffers relaxed noticeably, a grin plucking at the corner of his mouth.

“One thing you forgot.”

Jeffers' eyes narrowed. “What's that?”

“This Quantro can read sign. He's a man hunter. He'll figure it.”

Jeffers' frown disappeared and he smiled again. “Hell, who is he, Daniel Boone? Or maybe Davy Crockett? He wear one of those raccoon hats with the tail hangin' down his back? Nobody, not even an Apache, could track us over this ground. And not in the dark.”

“Maybe he can, maybe he can't,” conceded Upton. “I got a better idea. Why don't we split up? You and Webster head for Nogales, and me an' Dobey'll run for the border. That'll split the trail. He can't follow both of us.”

Jeffers pursed his lips. “Yeah, that's good.” He turned to Jimmy Webster. “We'll do that. If this Quantro's such an all fired eagle-eye, then he can choose who he's gonna trail.”

Webster nodded. “I guess we'll be moving out. We want to leave him some sign before dark so he's sure to see it.”

“Yeah, you'd better had,” Upton said with an expression the two men missed as they turned to their horses. “You dumb bastards,” he added under his breath.

Jeffers had one foot in the stirrup and a hand on the saddle horn when Upton's Colt cleared leather. The canyon was filled with sound as the gun roared. Jeffers screamed as the bullet slammed into his ribcage. He crumpled. His hand fell away from the saddle and his boot slipped out of the stirrup so that he slid under his horse. The animal took two or three steps, edging sideways. Jeffers groaned, eyes closed as he lay on the rocky ground.

On the blind side of Jeffers' horse, Webster was already in the saddle. As soon as he heard the first shot, he put two and two together and came up with four. Without waiting to catch his packhorse's lead-rope, he jerked back on the reins and his mount reared into a turn. Before Jeffers' body had hit the ground, Webster was laid flat along his horse's mane, spurring it down the canyon at full gallop.

Upton swore at Webster's fast reactions. He dropped his Colt back into its holster, then snaked a hand to the Winchester in the saddle scabbard. In a flash it was in his hands, the horse swinging toward him. Instead of pushing it away, he swung the rifle barrel up over the horse's neck and used the saddle as a rest. He worked the action as he sighted.

The Winchester barked.

The bullet cracked past Webster's ducked head to ricochet off the canyon wall. Upton couldn't afford to miss the next shot. He hadn't the time to go chasing Webster all over the desert. He dropped his aim, working the lever. The spent cartridge ejected into the air and before it completed its twisting journey to the ground, he had pulled the trigger again.

Webster's horse whinnied shrilly. Its legs began to fold under it while dust still churned from its flailing hooves. The front legs buckled first, the head smashing into the ground. Momentum carried the rump high, backbone almost bent double, whiplashing. Webster was thrown from the saddle, pin wheeling in the air. The horse badly executed a half somersault until it collapsed into itself. It lay in a tangled heap, legs thrust out at awkward angles. Webster crumpled beyond it, unmoving.

Upton waited a second to see if Webster ran. When he didn't, he turned to Dobey, who had stood rigid through the short seconds of the gunfight. “Dobey, watch Webster. If he moves shoot him.”