The Lawmen (10 page)

19

“Christ,” Clay moaned in frustration.

“You white trash fool,” Essex said. “This is your fault.”

“My fault?”

“You hadn’t started that fight, he wouldn’t have been able to run off.”

“If you had stayed in Topaz like I told you, there wouldn’t have been a fight to start.”

Essex wiped his bleeding nose on his sleeve. “Damn. Ain’t no arguing with somebody as stupid as you.”

“Vance has got a good lead on us,” Clay said. “Let’s stop blaming each other and get after him.”

In the dim light provided by the fire, the two men gathered their weapons and ammunition. “He took his pistol with him,” Essex said, searching in vain for it. “Damn, I liked that pistol.”

“Why? You didn’t know how to use it.”

While Essex loaded the Henry repeater and filled his pockets with spare shells, Clay loaded the sawed-off shotgun and completed the longer process of loading his cap-and-ball Colt revolver. Essex said, “I wonder why he didn’t take the guns, come down the hill and shoot us?”

“He probably figured it would be hard to find us in the dark down there, and there was too much of a chance one of us would get him. He probably didn’t want the noise, either. If there’s Apaches around, gunfire would bring them sure as hell.”

Clay finished with the revolver and holstered it. “Let’s go,” he said.

They started down the far side of the hill toward the brushy draw, feeling their way in the dark. Every step brought pain to their cactus-punctured bodies. “Shit! ” Essex swore, stepping gingerly. “I got more needles in me than a damn porcupine.”

They reached the mesquite bosque where they had tethered the horses. “They’re all gone,” Clay said, looking around. Two saddles and bridles were still there.

Essex said, “I wonder, did he have sense enough to take them other two horses with him, or did he just run them off?”

“With those cuffs on, he’d have trouble managing a lead line and two horses. With luck, he let them go. Besides, he’s stupid.”

“We got to catch him before he gets back to Topaz.”

“First we need the horses.”

“You leave that to me,” Essex said, taking the lariat from his saddle. “Give me your rope.”

“I’ll go with—”

“You stay here. I’ll do better by myself. I know horses; been ridin’ ‘em since I was big enough to walk. He lets them go, they’ll come right back to water.”

Essex took the ropes and vanished into the darkness.

He returned about an hour later, leading both horses. Quickly he and Clay saddled and bridled their mounts. Essex jammed the Henry repeater into the saddle scabbard. Something about the look on the black man’s face made Clay say, “Remember—we want Vance alive.”

“That ain’t what I got in mind,” said Essex fiercely.

“I’ll be right beside you if you try anything funny,” Clay warned.

“We’ll see,” Essex said. He swung onto his horse. “Come on, if you’re coming.”

They made their way out of the draw, onto the trail, and back down the pass through the mountains, going as fast as they could in the nearly total darkness. Clay fell behind Essex, but the black man didn’t wait for him. He had wanted to get Vance alone from the first. This would be his chance.

 Essex’s nose had stopped bleeding, but the jarring of the horse made it start again. He felt every ache and pain from the fall down the hill and the fight with Clay. His left eye was swelling where Clay had hit him. He couldn’t wait till he had a chance to stop and pull out the cactus needles.

Essex rode through the night. The new moon rose, its sliver of light affording the same amount of vision. The up and down terrain was difficult. Essex held the horse to as fast a pace as he dared. Maybe he’d get lucky and Vance’s mount would stumble and break a leg, or throw him and run off. Several times Essex stopped to listen. He could not hear Vance in front of him, and after a while he could no longer hear Clay behind him. He smiled at that.

As the first blush of dawn crept into the sky, Essex was in the foothills, descending to the San Marcos Valley. Through a gap in the hills, he glimpsed the distant river, a glittering pink ribbon in the early fight. He reached a spot where he could see a good distance before him, and he pulled his sweating horse onto a slight rise. He dismounted, giving the animal a breather while he scanned the trail. About two miles ahead of him rose a cloud of dust. Essex climbed back onto the horse.

He rode through the gathering light, rocks and brush resolving themselves out of the shadows. He had the Henry repeater, but it would be difficult to shoot a man while riding—and he couldn’t shoot worth shit, anyway. A pistol would be better for fighting from horseback. He wished he’d gotten the other pistol from Chandler—of course that dumb peckerwood probably wouldn’t have let him have it.

He gained steadily on the man before him. He was close enough to recognize Vance’s checked shirt now. Vance’s hat hung behind him, bouncing by its chin cord; his long dark hair was blown straight back by the wind. Then something made Vance turn, and he saw Essex behind him. Vance picked up the pace, lathering his horse with the reins. Essex urged his tired animal on.

Essex closed in. The horses were about equal in speed, but Essex was a better rider, especially on this rough ground. There were less than a hundred yards between them. Vance drew the pistol from his belt. Awkwardly, because of the handcuffs, he turned and fired, wasting a shot at that distance, trying to scare Essex off. It didn’t work.

The two men rode on, with Essex gaining. Vance had a hard time gripping the reins and the pistol while wearing the cuffs. His hair was blowing into his eyes each time he looked back. Vance turned with the pistol again, then decided to wait before using another bullet.

Essex knew that the dangerous part would be when he closed in. Vance was probably a good shot from horseback— he could hardly be worse than Essex—and Essex would be at a disadvantage even though he had the longer-ranging rifle.

Essex drew within fifty yards, then hung back, keeping off Vance’s rear, eating his dust, trying to come up with a plan. The trail was moving toward the valley—every now and then a turn revealed the broad plain in the distance. The trail followed the course of a dry wash, still dotted with pools of water from the rain, with a long, flat-topped ridge to one side.

Essex pushed his horse off to the left, up the incline, and onto the ridge. He rode along the ridge top parallel to Vance. Vance turned and was surprised to no longer see Essex behind him. Then he saw him on the ridge, and Essex could make out the bewilderment on the outlaw’s face as Vance tried to figure what he was up to.

Essex surged well ahead of Vance, letting his horse go, holding nothing back. Then he came off the ridge, guiding his horse down the slope, aiming for a point on the trail where his path would intersect Vance’s. As he drew close, Vance aimed his pistol and fired. Essex kept his head low. He reached level ground, drawing closer still. Vance fired again—Essex heard the buzz of the bullet.

Essex quickly made up the remaining distance between himself and Vance. He saw fear in the young man’s eyes; he saw Vance’s horse shy. He kicked his own reluctant horse broadside into Vance’s. There was a terrific shock as the two horses collided, and men and animals went down in a cloud of dust, the horses screaming.

Essex was thrown clear. He lay stunned for a second, then got up. Vance was already up, going for the pistol he had dropped in the collision. Essex leaped on him before he could pick the weapon up and spun him to the ground. On his knees, Vance swung his cuffed hands, raking Essex across the temple. There was blinding pain from the impact of the metal cuffs, and Essex fell backward.

Vance went for the pistol again. Essex shook off the pain, scrambled to his feet and tackled Vance from behind, with both men going down. This time Essex was up first. He hit Vance twice in the face with his fists, knocking him back to the dust. Then he turned and picked up the pistol. As Vance rose and lunged forward, Essex pointed the pistol in his face, cocking it.

Vance stopped, arms outstretched. Essex’s eyes were wild. His chest rose and fell. This was the moment he had waited for.

Vance gulped; sweat streamed from his forehead. “Go on. Get it over with. Pull the trigger.”

Essex’s finger curled on the trigger. Then he eased off. Gradually his breathing steadied. Blood ran down his face and into his left eye where the handcuffs had torn open his temple. “No,” he said at last. “I ain’t putting myself on your level, Hopkins. You’re going to have a trial, fair and legal. And then I’ll see you at the end of a rope. We’ll give white man’s justice one more chance.”

With a quick movement, Essex rapped Vance over the head with the gun barrel. The young man bent over, holding his head. “Christ, not again!”

Essex led Vance to the horses, which were standing now. He took a rope from one of the saddles, tied one end around Vance’s cuffs and the other end to a high branch of a mesquite tree, so that Vance had to stand with his arms upraised. Essex wiped blood from his eye, then he checked the sweat-lathered horses. Miraculously, both were all right—beyond some scrapes and cuts—after their collision and fall. He unsaddled them and led them to a pool of water in the wash to drink. When they were done, he rubbed them down and hobbled them out to graze.

Then he went back to Vance, who moaned from his uncomfortable position, “God damn, my head is killing me.”

Essex took a saddle canteen and held it to Vance’s lips. “Have a drink.” When Vance was finished, Essex took the canteen, sat in the dappled shade of a mesquite tree and waited for Clay.

20

Essex was plucking cactus needles from his legs when Clay rode up. “It’s about time,” Essex remarked. His bandanna was tied around his head as a bandage for the cut on his temple caused by Vance’s handcuffs. There was dried blood all over the left side of his face, where he’d smeared blood while wiping it out of his eye. “I thought all you Reb officers was such good riders?”

“I was an infantry captain,” Clay told him. “I had to walk. I never rode anything but mules when I was a boy—I didn’t have all your advantages. ”

From his painful standing position beneath the mesquite tree, Vance cried, “Hey, Chandler—cut me down, will you? My arms feel like they’re coming out of their sockets.”

Clay chuckled at Vance’s predicament, despite his weariness. “You mind?” he asked Essex.

Essex shrugged. “You’re the boss man.”

Clay eased himself from his lathered horse. “You did a good job catching him,” he told Essex.

“Why, thankee, Massa,” replied Essex with an exaggerated drawl. “Does I gits to go ’round to de big house now fo’ some watermelon?”

Clay ignored him. “I’m surprised he’s still alive. I figured you were going to kill him.”

“The thought never crossed my mind.”

Clay’s legs felt creakier than ever as he crossed the ground to Vance. He untied the rope that bound Vance’s handcuffs to the high mesquite branch and let it fall. As Vance closed his eyes and moaned with relief, Clay warned him, “Move from there, and I’ll tie this rope to your saddle horn and make you walk the rest of the way to Tucson.”

Clay unbuckled his saddle cinches. He hauled the saddle and blanket off the exhausted horse and rubbed him down with the burlap sack. He wiped his sweating face on his sleeves and looked at his watch. Six-fifteen, and already the sun was hot. “We’ve lost a lot of time.”

Essex was still pulling needles from his legs. “Can’t do nothing about it till these animals is rested,” he said philosophically. “Not unless you want to walk—you bein’ the infantryman and all.”

“We should still have a decent lead on Wes and his men. The only way they can catch us is if they kill their horses, and they won’t do that.”

“Don’t bet on it, lawman,” Vance said from his new position on the ground. “This ain’t over yet. Not by a long shot it ain’t.”

“Shut up, Vance. If you’d had sense enough to take all three of these horses with you, we never would have caught you.”

Essex looked up. “What you mean, ‘we’?”

Clay watered his horse, then hobbled him in the bunch- grass to graze. He drank some water himself, and he joined Essex in the mesquite’s shade. Essex had finished removing the cactus needles from his trousers, now he examined his shirt. The old shirt was spotted with blood from his cut temple; it was tom from his fight with Clay and the fall down the hill. Clay realized his own clothes were not in much better condition. His jaw ached where Essex had punched him.

“Damn thing’s no better’n a rag,” Essex said about the shirt. “Ought to get rid of it. All that big deputy money I’m making now, I can buy me a whole suit of clothes.”

He pulled the shirt over his head, revealing his back, which was a mass of cross-hatched scars, layer upon layer of them, raised off his back like tumorous growths.

Clay took in his breath at the sight. His stomach went weak. “Jesus,” he said. He’d seen terrible sights in the war, but this . . .

Essex looked up from what he was doing. “What is it?”

“Your back,” Clay said.

“Oh, that,” Essex said. “Got that from ol’ Massa Woodbine and his overseer. They surely loved whuppin’ their niggers. There’s plenty got worse, of course—had legs broke into all kinds of funny positions, fingers and toes chopped off. We was one bunch of happy darkies, all right, singin’ and dancin’ like you wouldn’t believe.”

Clay said nothing.

“Ain’t got no smart-ass answer for that, have you?” Essex demanded in a different tone of voice.

After a second Clay replied, “No, I guess I don’t.”

Clay turned away so that he wouldn’t have to look at Essex’s back. He worked at getting the needles out of his own body and clothing. Essex finished with his shirt and put it back on. He sat in the shade and looked at his old, cracked shoes—so old they’d lost all color. One of the soles had a hole in it. Then he cast an appraising eye at Vance. “What size foot you got, boy?”

“Huh?” said Vance.

“Take off them boots.”

“Go to hell.”

Essex sighed. He drew the revolver and went to hit Vance over the head with it again.

“All right, all right,” Vance said hastily. “I’ll take them off.”

“‘Motivation,’” Essex explained to Clay.

Vance pulled off his fancy boots. Essex tried one over his toeless socks, stood and beamed. “Hopkins, I think you and me just made a trade. ”

“You can’t take my boots. That’s—that’s stealing.”

“No, didn’t you hear me? I said we made a trade.”

While Essex pulled on the other boot, Vance appealed to Clay, “You going to let him get away with this, Marshal?”

Clay spread his hands helplessly. “A trade’s a trade.”

 Vance swore. Essex stuffed his trouser legs into the boots, then tossed Vance his old shoes. “These are yours now.”

“I ain’t wearing no nigger’s shoes,” Vance protested.

 “Suit yourself,” Essex told him. “You’re going to be in some pain when we got to walk those horses, though.” Vance hesitated, then put on Essex’s old shoes, handling them gingerly, as though they contained a deadly disease.

“They won’t make you turn black, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Essex said.

Vance swore again. “That damn overseer should have whipped you more.”

Essex didn’t take offense; he was admiring his new footwear. “This is the finest pair of boots I ever had. Matter of fact, those was the best ones I ever had before this. So you treat ’em good, now,” he told Vance.

Vance said nothing, and Essex went on, still admiring the rich leather boots. “I recollect in Tennessee it used to get so cold in the wintertime, we’d chase the hogs out of the mud, then stick our bare feet where they’d been layin’, to warm ‘em up.”

Clay was surprised. “We used to do the same thing, my brother and me. Our feet were all cracked and bleeding in winter, but they’d heal right up when summer came.”

Essex nodded. “That’s right. That’s just how it was. You sure you wasn’t a slave someplace? Maybe you just passing for white now. ”

Clay would have hit him again, but he was too tired, and he didn't feel like getting in another fight. “Shut up and let me get rid of these damn cactus needles,” he said.

When Clay’s horse was rested, the three men started back up the trail for Tucson. They walked their horses at first, to warm them up, then they mounted. The July sun rose high in the sky, beating down on them. No one spoke. They were lost in their own thoughts and in the searing heat. The rainwater was long dried up now, save for a few shaded rock pools. In the hills around them multiarmed saguaros stood like silent sentinels from an age gone by.

As they topped yet another rise in the trail, there was a rifle shot. Clay’s horse reared, screaming, and went down beneath him.