The Gila Wars (23 page)

CHAPTER 42

The shade from the live oak that stood over the tent made
it look like evening instead of late afternoon. Light dappled the ground through the thick, broad leaves, dotting everything in sight with shadows and grayness. Wood smoke filled the air, overtaking the smell of meat cooking over the flames; campfires were being started for the coming night, warming up a few of the tubs that had been brought along for baths.

Fiddle music floated in the air, and someone up to the north of where Josiah stood, near where he and Scrap had camped, laughed heartily. Another hoot and holler followed and echoed through the shallow canyon the camp had been set in, but Josiah ignored it. He wondered why McNelly would leave a message for him with Doc Tinker. The substance of the message mildly concerned him, but instead of celebrating his own safe return, or worrying about his fate with McNelly, all Josiah could think of was burying Juan Carlos.

It would be an odd world without the Mexican. Juan Carlos was like the shadows that danced across the top of Josiah's boots. One minute he was there, and the next, he was gone, only to appear months later, unexpected, but just at the right time, when Josiah needed him the most. He never knew why that was.

Even now, Josiah expected to see Juan Carlos ease up the trail, his death only a ruse, not really true, but some greater strategy to get closer to Cortina. But Josiah knew he was deluding himself. Juan Carlos was dead. He would never show up again, not when Josiah was safe in Ranger camp, and not down the road, when circumstances were the most dire.

Tom Darkson walked out of the tent stiffly, unpegging the open flap, his ribs bound tight, forcing him to stand straight and walk as easily as possible. The flap of the tent snapped back quickly into place, the breeze catching it just right. “You're next,” Darkson said.

“Thanks.”

“Doc says I ain't gonna be up to snuff for a few days, but I think he's wrong about that. He don't know nothin' about me. I heal like a lizard. Momma said I'd grow a finger back if ever one got cut off by mistake.”

Josiah just shook his head. It sounded like something Scrap would say. Must be the folly of youth, believing that they would heal overnight. Maybe he had been that way himself. He didn't remember it. Didn't care to. His first battle had been bigger and bloodier than the one they'd all experienced today. Still, there was no comparing the times. They were different. So was the war.

“You'd do yourself a favor to pay heed to what Doc said to you. He's been through this a time or two. I've seen men stronger than you fall over and die from injuries that seemed far less than you've suffered, I'm sure,” Josiah said.

Darkson stopped just past Josiah and ran his hand through his hair, like he was confused. His hair was a wiry black rat's nest, and his hat was nowhere to be seen. Probably left out on the battlefield.

Darkson's eyes were wide, and his face still dirty from the fight. “I was born too late to fight in the War Between the States, Sergeant Wolfe. I always feel like there's a story I'm missin' when I'm standin' in the room with two men or more that served. I'm not in the know. But after today, I feel like I understand a little more. I saw things today that I never thought I would. Blood and death ain't as easy to swallow when it's a man, even a Mexican, compared to a squirrel or another piece of meat. I can't tell you how many times I slit the throat of a deer, bled him out. But what I saw done today, well, I don't think Momma would be too proud.”

Josiah wanted to tell the boy that there was no way he would ever understand what a survivor of the War Between the States had gone through, and that he should be glad of it, but he said nothing. He just stared at Tom Darkson and wondered if he'd killed his first man today, since he didn't come right out and say so. If that was why he was jittery.

The guilt and depression would come later. In the middle of the night, when the boy was alone. Or maybe in his sleep, when the dead man proceeded to turn a comforting dream into a nightmare—one that would never go away. Josiah still walked with the dead in his sleep, visited the bloody battlefields of his past. But they were dimmer, farther away, not so urgent and real.

Still, the nightmares were enough to wake him and make him feel like he was still there. His stomach always burned with regret for days after, and nothing would calm him. Some called the affliction Soldier's Heart, but Josiah never liked to put a name to such things. He just considered it a bad memory that came from a boy serving in a war that, in the end, had nothing to do with him.

“Did you see Elliot return to camp?” Josiah finally asked.

Darkson looked at him oddly, like he'd been expecting him to say something entirely different than he did. “Yeah, I saw him. He rode in with the captain. Why?”

“Just wanting to know he was here somewhere.”

“Last I saw him, he was sportin' a good shiner and tippin' back a bottle of whiskey.”

“Good to know, thanks.” Josiah turned away and walked back inside the tent, leaving Tom Darkson to go wherever he was going next.

* * *

Verlyn Tinker opened up the cupboard, exposing a row
of bottles and crockery that was previously hidden from sight. He grabbed a fresh bottle of whiskey and closed the cupboard. When he turned back to face Josiah, there was a tiredness in Tinker's eyes that had not been there before—or had not been seen.

“So who'd you fight with?” Josiah asked.

“I wasn't out there today.” Tinker sat the whiskey bottle on the table next to the chair Josiah was in. “Take your shirt off.”

Josiah started to undo the buttons on his sleeves. “I mean in the war.”

“Oh. Pennsylvania, the Second Regiment, Company K to start. I was raised up near Wellsville in York County.”

Josiah nodded as he slipped his shirt over his head. Pennsylvania explained the man's undefined Yankee accent.

“Wasn't in the regiment long, though,” Tinker continued, “I found my way to the Ambulance Corps pretty quickly. I had the stomach for blood, the knack for healing when I could, and a soft touch with a saw. Antietam was really the first battle I served in as litter-bearer, but I went on from there to other things medical. Never had time for school. Everything I learned, I learned on the battlefield.”

Tinker poured a dab of whiskey on a cloth and started to reach toward the cauterized wound on Josiah's shoulder—but Josiah drew back instinctively. “Antietam?” he asked. There was a coldness in his voice that was unmistakable. All of the years that had passed since the war vanished, and the old priorities and hatreds entered the tent as if on command. It was like the air just stopped moving and winter invaded the room. Josiah shivered.

“You were there,” Tinker said. It wasn't a question, but a statement. The range of emotion in Tinker's voice stayed steady, didn't change from his normal warm tone to cold like Josiah's had. “The war's over, Wolfe. That was thirteen years ago. A lifetime ago.”

“We didn't have an Ambulance Corps.”

“It was a bloody day.”

“The bloodiest.” Josiah eyed Tinker differently, with apprehension as the doc stood frozen, holding the cloth, waiting, it seemed, for permission to carry on with what he had started—caring for Josiah's wound.

Josiah drew in a deep breath and closed his eyes briefly, doing his best to push away images from that day. It was almost impossible as they mixed with the fighting of the current day. When he opened his eyes, Tinker was staring at him compassionately, just waiting.

“I mean you no harm,” Tinker said gently. “What I learned in those days only aids in my efforts today. We all carry our scars from the war, Wolfe, but our motivations and loyalties are the same now. I laid down my sword a long time ago. Most of the men here have done the same, at least as much as possible. I'd assumed you had, too.”

Josiah nodded. “You're right. It's just . . . I lost a lot of good friends that day.”

“There's no need to explain. Words like ‘Antietam' are powerful. You look of age, and I should have been more careful in what I spoke of. I think little of the past these days. That fight has been replaced with another enemy, and the battles continue.” Tinker motioned with the cloth. “Do you mind? Your wound needs to be cleaned and sewed up.”

Josiah glanced at the wound. Tinker was right. He needed tending to, even if it was by a Yankee. He nodded, and soon felt the cool touch of the wet cloth. “Why you'd come to Texas and ride with the Rangers?”

Tinker shrugged. “One thing led to another. Home was different when I returned. I wasn't comfortable there. I needed a new start, so I headed west. A lot of us did that.”

“With bushwhackers and the like?”

“Hardly.” Tinker pulled back and poured more whiskey onto the cloth. “I ended up here because of matters of the heart.” A slight smile passed across Tinker's face, then he went back to work, wiping away the dirt on Josiah's skin. “But I'm restless, have been since the war, I suppose, and that relationship didn't work out. I'd had enough of winters, and the weather suited me here—still does as far as that goes, so I stayed. The cause of the Rangers suits me, too. I guess my home is on the battlefield sewing up fellas like you, making them feel better, if I can. Just because you're born in a place doesn't mean you belong there for all of your life.”

All of the hesitation Josiah felt about Tinker faded away as the man talked on and worked at fixing up his wound.

Letting go of his own anger over the war had happened a long time ago, or at least he'd thought it had. Josiah had ridden with Yankees before, worked with them, one way or another, to set things right, like in Austin, when it came to freeing Scrap from the jail. The two men who had helped him the most were from Massachusetts.

“You might want to take a swig of this,” Tinker said, offering the bottle of whiskey to Josiah. “It's going to hurt a bit when I sew you up. Your muscles are tender, and the skin's raw around the wound.”

“I'm fine.”

“Have it your way. I do have to say, though, that whoever set things right with this wound did a fine job. You'd most likely be dead now if it hadn't been cauterized.”

“Juan Carlos,” Josiah whispered.

“I'm sorry?”

“Juan Carlos. He saved my life one last time. I couldn't save his life though. I failed him.”

Recognition crossed Tinker's face as he sat the whiskey on the table and picked up a needle and thread. “One of the men who was killed in the battle?”

“Yes, a good friend.” Josiah paused as Tinker came at him with the needle. “You said you had a message for me from McNelly. What is it?”

Tinker sighed and froze his hand in midair again. “You're to leave the bodies with me. I'm supposed to prepare them for transport, and you're to see Captain McNelly first thing in the morning.”

“Transport?”

“I don't know the details, I'm just the messenger. The captain looked pretty tuckered out, so I think he was heading to his tent for some rest. I did what I could for him, but that was little, in his condition. He didn't want to be bothered for the rest of the day. You sure you don't want some of this whiskey?”

Josiah stared at the bottle, reconsidered, and nodded yes. “It might smooth things out. Might just take the edge off how I'm feeling.”

“Yes,” Tinker said. “It might just do that.”

CHAPTER 43

By the time Verlyn Tinker finished his doctoring duties
with Josiah, it was early evening. Josiah stood outside the tent, his stomach grumbling with hunger, and his veins and throat still a little numb from swigs of whiskey he'd taken to get through being sewed up.

Tinker followed Josiah outside the tent and lit a torch that stood just to the side of the entrance. The tall, rangy man stood back then and dug a little bag of tobacco out of his vest pocket. He proceeded to roll himself a cigarette with quick skill, producing a perfectly round, tight smoke that suggested he'd been exercising his fingers in such a manner for a number of years. Scrap's quirlies always looked sloppy and burned quickly.

“I'll get one of the boys to help me move the bodies,” Tinker said. “But you might take care with the possessions, saddlebags and the like. I don't want to be responsible,” Tinker said.

Josiah took the man's words to be an order, though they weren't delivered with a demand, just quiet authority. “Howerson had little on him. His personal possessions must be in his tent. Juan Carlos had a saddlebag on his horse, but I don't know what else. I don't even know where he slept.”

Tinker shrugged. “Can't possess something if it's not there, now, can you?”

“I guess not. What are you going to do?” Josiah asked, staring in the declining light toward the two horses. They stood still as statues, unconcerned with anything that was going on around them.

“I told you, prepare them for transport. Like we did in the war. Nothing's changed since then except what I use to finish off the chore. Used to be a simple soldier would just be buried in a mass grave, or in the hole where he dropped.”

Josiah nodded. “I dug my fair share of graves.”

“We all did.” There was a nod of acknowledgment, of the shared experience that neither of them seemed to be able to escape.

“Just for soldiers.”

“Well then, you know the well-to-do soldier, or an officer, would be sent home for burial. We used creosote, arsenic, mercury, turpentine, all combined with whatever alcohol was handy to preserve the bodies. But since the war, formaldehyde simplifies the task. Of all the things I learned during the war, the skills I gained from spending time with an embalming surgeon were the least favorite. I've got a good dose of formaldehyde in the crockery in the tent; though my practice is rusty, I figure I can serve the dead adequately, but I'm no undertaker mind you. Two different things anyhow, an embalmer and an undertaker. There's no coin in this task for me. I expect the chemicals were brought along in case McNelly or Robinson took a fall and died. I'm mildly surprised that the captain is willing to use the formaldehyde for someone other than them, but those were the orders I was given, so I'm just following them and not asking any questions.”

Josiah looked away from the dead bodies, bent motionless over the horses' backs, and dropped his gaze to the ground. “You didn't ride with Captain Fikes, did you?”

Tinker shook his head no. “The Frontier Battalion? No. I've ridden with Captain McNelly from the start of this new incarnation of the Ranger organization. I knew little of Fikes. Only what I heard of him when he was killed, and then I didn't know what to believe was true or a legend birthing itself. You know how things get started.”

“I do.”

“So what's all of this have to do with Captain Fikes? He died a year ago, or longer, if I remember right.”

“One of the men killed today was his half brother.”

“Howerson?”

“No, Juan Carlos Montegné.”

“The Mexican?”

Josiah nodded yes.

Tinker stuck the cigarette in his mouth, fished a match out of his pocket, and lit it with a deep, thoughtful draw. “Well, I'll be,” he said, exhaling a cloud of thin blue smoke after a long second.

“Not a lot of people were aware of the connection,” Josiah said. “It was a secret that was uncomfortable even for Juan Carlos. I always got the impression that he wasn't much welcome in Mexican circles, as much as he wasn't welcome in the Anglo world. I saw him act as a servant in his own brother's house on one occasion, and there was no acknowledgment from anyone in the house that he was anything but just that, a servant. I think he was treated poorly in that house after his brother was killed, at least by everyone but his niece, Pearl, the captain's daughter.”

The air seemed to disappear inside Josiah's chest as he spoke Pearl's name. He had not considered, until that very moment, how she would react to the news of Juan Carlos's death. He had tried as hard as he could to put her out of his mind.

Obviously, Captain McNelly intended to have Juan Carlos's body returned to Austin. The thought of it, all that such a journey entailed, left Josiah's throat dry, all things considered. He hoped McNelly had other plans. Plans that did not include him, for one thing. Even though leaving Juan Carlos with a stranger at this point didn't seem right.

Tinker drew in on the cigarette, causing the tip to glow brightly. The glow met with the torches that had fully taken hold, causing Josiah to look away.

The torches flickered casually, reacting to the breeze that came and went, offering more light around the tent, as if to announce that the doc was still open for business.

“I don't imagine it was an easy life,” Tinker said. “I know little of Juan Carlos. He was like a shadow, always lurking about, gone before you could have a decent conversation with him. He was a spy for McNelly and the whole of the Rangers, I know that much, but little else. His legend will mesh with Captain Fikes's now.”

“If the world is to know they were brothers.”

“Sad that it might not.”

“Juan Carlos had been a spy long before the Frontier Battalion came into existence. He was pretty much Captain Fikes's shadow, even back to the State Police days. He was good at blending in, not being seen. I always wished I had his talent and instinct, but I didn't get to know him until I started riding with the Rangers. Now I think he was one of the closest friends I've come to have,” Josiah said.

“That would explain Captain McNelly's decision then.” Tinker puffed on the cigarette one last time, then tamped it out on the bottom of his boot. “I better get started if I'm going to see the sack before midnight.”

“You sure you don't want my help?”

“No, you've done enough on this day. The lifting will do you no good, only harm. The sight of embalming is not pleasant. I know you've seen worse things, but this is your friend. You don't need that memory.”

Josiah started to insist, but let his words fall back down his throat. Tinker was right. “All right. I'll take care with the saddlebag and the horses, then.”

“Good. Wait here. I'll be back with help in two shakes.”

Josiah watched as Tinker lumbered off in the direction of a small collection of dog tents. In the grayness of the light, Tinker looked old and haggard, like a man who had slaved about all his life in one job or another. Which was odd, because just a few minutes before, he'd seemed lively and warm, full of compassion. Maybe it was the healer in him—or maybe it was what Josiah needed to see, or feel. Either way, he liked the man, and was glad for his skills and presence. His shoulder felt better than it had in days. All he needed now was a good bath and a warm plate of food. But they would have to wait.