Renegade Page 8

  Captain Gringo opened fire as the Yaqui were leaning into their final rush for the top. He started on his left and traversed the gun methodically to his right, aiming not at the men but into the brush at about mid-shin level. He cut at least two off at the knees before the others, as expected, dropped behind the bushes they’d been using for cover and, just as he’d expected, it didn’t do them much good!

  The Maxim snarled its woodpecker song of death in another blue haze of cordite smoke as, down in the target area, dust, pebbles, shattered twigs, and gobs of bloody, tattered flesh geysered off the side jot the mountain. One man broke and sprang to his feet in panic, as one man always did. The American ignored him as he finished his first traverse and hosed the muzzle back for another sweep of lead slugs. Someone, seeing the first man running and not getting hit, jumped to his feet to follow, as someone always did. As Captain Gringo completed his traverse he ceased fire. By now seven men were up and loping down the slope in individual clouds of dust, neither screaming, which was to their credit, nor cool enough to dive for cover, which was foolish. Captain Gringo opened fire again and swept the slope at higher elevation, cutting all but one Yaqui down on his first traverse. He swung the muzzle back and chopped the running Indian’s spine in two at the waist. Then he snapped, “Cover my back!” and rose to his feet, yanking the machine gun from its mount.

  He turned, bracing the breech on his hip as he held the scalding-hot jacket with his free hand, raising it to a forty-five-degree angle. As Gaston rolled away from his boots, aiming his own rifle down the slope they’d just smoked up, Captain Gringo glanced down, saw Tico and the girl were all right, and, ignoring the white dot sprawled in the dust two thirds of the way down, fired the Maxim.

  He hozed a stream of lead up into the sky and could see, as dust puffs tap-danced along the valley floor, that he had the elevation right. He sent a burst of plunging fire into the clump of trees down in the wash and a dozen running figures exploded out of it, running in confused circles and then, as he’d hoped, bunching up to run away en masse. He laughed and raised the barrel to follow them with his plunging fire. The stream of bullets came down on them like thunderbolts from the blue and they started dropping. There was a tinny click as the belt ran dry and he dropped the hot barrel, swearing in pain. But not one of the rag-doll figures sprawled in the slowly clearing cloud of dust down there were moving.

  Favoring his burned palm, he put the gun back on its mount and fumbled another ammo box open. Gaston said, “I see no need to reload. Merde alors! Can you imagine what it would be like if anyone ever had a serious war with these things? Those last poor bastards are at least a full kilometer away!”

  “You mean they were. Think anyone down in that brush is still alive?”

  “If he is, you just made a Christian out of him. Wounded men simply die in these mountains. Survivors spread the word to be more cautious. I doubt if we’ll see any more of this particular band. The Yaqui are most truculent, but hardly given to suicide. This thing frightens the devil out of me!”

  “Yeah, and I just blew away half our ammunition. That’s the weak spot of this weapon. That and having to keep filling it up with water. I’ll bet I boiled the jacket dry just now.”

  He wrapped a pocket kerchief around his injured hand and gingerly unscrewed the little radiator valve atop the jacket. A faint whisp of steam curled out and he said, “Dry as a bone. I thought it felt light this time. Let’s see what it did to my hand.”

  He unwrapped the kerchief and blew on his red palm. His hands were calloused for an officer’s, but, yeah, he was going to have some blisters there. He frowned and said, “That’s funny. The first time I tried firing from the hip I blistered hell out of myself. This time I fired much longer and it wasn’t as bad.”

  “Perhaps your hands are getting used to your unusual style of warfare?”

  “I don’t think that’s it. I think the empty jacket insulated me from the barrel’s heat. Jesus, if it was dry even before I stood up with it—”

  He took the armorer’s wrench from its clip on the gun mount and unbolted the retaining bands holding the water jacket around the long barrel. He slid the empty jacket off and gingerly touched the Parkerized steel of the much thinner barrel. It was hot, but no hotter than many a rifle he’d felt after an hour on the firing range.

  He said, “Shit, this water jacket’s just a tinker’s notion! The gun works good enough without it!”

  Gaston started to object. Then he shrugged and said, “You may be right. Most weapons systems are over-designed. On the other hand, if it were to overheat and warp while one was firing it.”

  “No,” the American insisted, “Maxim designed these things to be used in siege situations, not in the field. If you had to fire it for hours you’d need more than the water jacket. You’d need a hose line running constant cooling to it. You’d need a trainload of ammunition, too. In any casual firefight, this thing should be able to fire dry for at least a full belt. Without the jacket, it would cool even faster as you stopped to put another belt in. Hell, I see no sense in packing this jacket along all over Mexico!”

  “It’s always best to travel fight as possible. It is also your neck.”

  “I’ve got to think up some sort of handle for the barrel before I try any more hip shooting. First I’ll see how the kids are and figure our next move. We can’t stay here. No telling how many Indians got clear, or who may have heard all the shooting.”

  “You go. I’ll stay up here on lookout.-”

  “That’s what I just said.”

  “You did? Ah, old soldiers need not indulge in idle chatter, hein? It is refreshing to meet a fighting man who doesn’t pontificate about details all soldiers know in advance.”

  Leaving Gaston, Captain Gringo slid down the slope to Rosalita and Tico. The boy was still staring down at the man he’d shot, his Krag in his hands. He said, “It’s fantastic! The first time I ever fired a gun I hit the pobrecito dead center!”

  “Don’t get cocky, Tico. I’ve fired too many rounds to remember, and I still miss from time to time. Let’s get the horses up and loaded. We can’t stay here.”

  “We are moving in broad daylight, Captain Gringo? I thought you said this was dangerous!”

  “It is. Aside from remembering all soldiers miss, remember all military maxims are only true ninety per cent of the time. There was a man named Custer, once, who wrote a very good manual on Indian fighting that the U.S. Army still uses. He got killed following his own rules, and they were very good rules, nine times out of ten.”

  “I understand. I take the advice of Mother Church with a grain of salt. What mistake did this Custer make, following the book too closely?”

  “Tell you later. They don’t apply here either way. Are you all right, Rosalita?”

  “Yes. I shot my pistol, too. It jumped all over the place and I did not hit anybody.”

  “Good girl. Let’s get moving.”

  As he started to unhobble the nearest pony Tico asked, “Where are we going? Back the way we came?”

  “No. Down the slope to that valley. That dry wash must run downhill and I want to clear these mountains fast.”

  “But you said it was best to ride the high country.”

  “Goddamn it, do as you’re told!”

  Then, noting the hurt look in the boy’s eyes, he added, “You did well in that fight just now, but if you want to be a fighting man, you have to obey orders. We’re not under fire now, so I’ll take the time to explain this once. There’s no time for discussion when bullets are flying. We’re changing our style because by now the Indians will know our style. They fought us in the high country. If they come back, that’s where they’ll expect to find us. On the other hand, that dry wash promises a fast, smooth ride, and the Yaqui are on foot. Gaston says the Chihuahua desert is just over those ridges to the east, and I’m betting the wash leads to and through a pass. Now, is there anything else you have to ask, or can we get our poor behinds out of here?”

>   Tico refused to meet his eyes as he asked quietly, “Yes. I would like to know what this business of orders and commands means. I do not remember anyone saying you were our commander. You may be Captain Gringo, but you are not a real captain, and in any case this is not an army and I am not a soldier. I will take suggestions, but I am not certain I have to take orders”

  Rosalita said, “Tico, my brother, you are speaking like a child!”

  “I am not a child, woman. I am the man of this family. What will anyone do if I decide I don’t like to take orders?”

  The American said, flatly, “Let me put it this way, Tico. If I give you an order, any order, and you don’t follow it to the letter, I’m going to kill you. Are there any other questions?”

  There weren’t.

  He hadn’t expected any.

  Chapter Nine

  “Would you really kill my brother?” asked Rosalita.

  They were camped for the afternoon in a brush-filled dry wash fanning out into the Chihuahua desert from the tawny eastern foothills of the Sierra. A broad, flat playa lay to their east and it would have been suicidal to try to cross it in daylight. If nobody spotted them out on the flats the desert sun promised to hit them almost as hard as Yaqui or Rurales. Gaston had said their goal was a desert town on the far side of the playa. Their plan was to cross an hour or so after sunset, once the hard-baked, salty desert pavement cooled down a bit.

  Captain Gringo hadn’t answered her question, so Rosalita repeated it. He and the girl were sharing a canteen and some dry tortillas in the shade of a mesquite grove. The bruises on the girl’s face were fading and she was beautiful in the dappled light, if you liked ’em young and at least half Indian. The Indian part didn’t worry him, but her age, and her brother, did. Glancing up the wash to where Tico was out of sight on lookout, with Gaston covering around the bend to the east, he shrugged and said, “Perhaps we were both showing off for a pretty girl.”

  “Pooh. He is my brother. Why should he show off for me?

  “Chiquita, if I could tell you why men do half the silly things they do I wouldn’t be here. I’d be cruising in my yacht off Long Island. I guess he’s just young. As I remember, it hurts to be a kid.”

  “Are you trying to provoke him because of me? You do not have to kill my brother if you wish to take advantage of me. If you want me that badly, I think it would be best if I accommodated you without telling him of the insult to our family. To save my brother I would sin again most willingly.”

  He said, “I’m not going to kill your brother and I’m not going to take advantage of you. I’m going to have a smoke.”

  Suiting action to his words, Captain Gringo fished a tobacco pouch and a packet of brown papers from his shirt pocket and proceeded to roll a cigarette. The girl stared thoughtfully at his tanned fingers as they worked and asked, with a slight pout, “Is it because of what that Rurale did to me that you find me repulsive?”

  “You’re not repulsive. You’re very pretty and I’m tired of repeating myself.”

  “But you just said you didn’t want me. I am not as ignorant as you may think. I have heard the older women talk of these matters. I know some men have delicate feelings about making love to a woman who has been perverse with another man.”

  “Rosalita, if I didn’t know it would be taken the wrong way I’d give you a good spanking. You two kids are turning out to be real brats.”

  He saw the puzzled hurt in her limpid doe eyes and added, “Tico knows Gaston and me are older and smarter. You know any man with normal appetites would want you. You both know why he has to take orders and you have to keep your knees together, too. So let’s stop this childish testing. Leaving aside the man who mistreated you, you know damned well every man in your village would have given a month’s pay to get in your pantaloons.”

  “I never wore pantaloons when I was a good girl. Tico made me put these pants on before we joined you because he said it was better to ride astride if one would take to the horseback life of the mountains.”

  She frowned and added, “Will you tell me something a good girl would be unable to ask a man? This wearing of pants feels very, well, constant, between one’s legs. I have been puzzled how men can wear them all the time without thinking more about their private parts than most women in skirts have to.”

  He laughed and confided, “I guess men do. Though you’re the one who’s having most of the carnal notions around here. As long as you’re so interested in the facts of life, Rosalita, I’m going to risk a duel to explain some things to you, and then I want to hear no more about your groin. If you want to know just where you stand with me, or even Gaston, there’s no doubt we’d both like to make love to you. You’re a beautiful girl and we’re both in good health. Neither of us are repelled by something that wasn’t your fault and, in any case, didn’t do you any obvious permanent damage. So stop batting those pretty lashes and fishing for compliments. It’s agreed you’re lovely. It’s also agreed neither Gaston nor I have any intention of taking you up on some half-baked offers you’re probably more confused about than we are.”

  “Did you agree to some sort of pact with the Frenchman about me?”

  “No. There was no need to discuss the matter,” he lied, adding, “Gaston is an adult. Grown men have as many desires or more than children, but by the time They’re old enough to vote they should have learned too much chocolate will rot your teeth, too much liquor will make you crazy, and chasing every skirt can get you killed.”

  “The older women said a real man took what he wanted. They said—”

  “I know what they said. That’s why they were all so rich and wore all those diamonds, too. You people down here are hard to understand. You put up with every tinhorn dictator and settle for tortillas and beans, yet you worry more about your crazy ideas of honor and kill one another over trifles. Maybe if the older women encouraged less machismo and admired brains instead of muscle they’d get to wear shoes!”

  “You have contempt for my people as well as me! I know I am a fallen woman, but what have my people ever done to you?”

  “Half of the Mexicans I’ve met so far have tried to get me killed. Nobody down here’s done me any favors, but I don’t dislike your people, Rosalita. I only wish they weren’t so dramatic.”

  He lit his smoke and got to his feet, saying, “I’m going to relieve Gaston on lookout. Do us all a favor and don’t ask him why he hasn’t tried to rape you. With luck, we’ll be in Vegas Salinas by this time tomorrow and you can go to confession and ask the priest if he finds you unattractive.”

  Ignoring her angry retort, Captain Gringo walked around the tethered horses and the bend of the wash to join Gaston. The Frenchman was hunkered down by the machine gun in the shade of a twisted mesquite The tall American stared out across the shimmering expanse of nothing much to the east and said, “I don’t think even those kids could get lost out there at night, do you?”

  “Not if either can walk a straight line. I take it m’sieu is considering our deserting them?”

  “That Rosalita is turning out to be a really dangerous little bundle. We’ve gotten them safely over the Sierras, and from here on gratitude seems to be all downhill. I thought I’d tell Tico it was time we split up and we’d go our separate ways.”

  Gaston spit out the husk of the mesquite pod he’d been chewing and shook his head, saying, “That is not wise, m’sieu. If you think he’s ever going to get up the courage to go for you, your best bet would be to kill him here and now. Even in Vegas Salinas there is a tendency to ask tedious questions when one kills a man, but out here—”

  “Damn it, I have no intention of hurting either of those kids.”

  “Ah, but I have been watching Tico and he has every intention of killing both you and me. As for your own fate, that is your own business. However, I am not quite ready to die. So if you don’t want to kill him, just leave the matter to me.”

  “I don’t want you to kill him, either, and I’ll take it personal if y
ou do. I know the kid’s getting more sullen by the minute, but … What in the hell do you think is wrong with him, Gaston?”

  “Merde, I don’t think, I know. His sister was raped. You and I know she was raped. Ergo, if they intend to make a new life in another part of Mexico, their shame must be wiped out completely.”

  “Shit, their whole village knows the girl was raped!”

  “Ah, but their village is far away. You and I are on this side of the Sierras, and Vegas Salinas is a small town.”

  Captain Gringo took a drag on his smoke, let it slowly out as he thought, and said, “In other words, if he’s going to make his move, it will be tonight, out there on the playa.”

  It was a statement, not a question, but Gaston nodded and said, “Yes, that is why I suggest we finish him here and now. We both know he will fail, since there are two of us, we’re both better fighters, and we will be expecting it. But a firelight at night on horseback is very fatiguing, and one of us, or the ponies, might catch a stray bullet. The girl would be safer is we simply ended it neatly,’ too. Since they’d be riding between us across the playa in the moonlight, she’d be in his line of fire when he went for at least one of us and we, of course, would be sending a lot of rounds in her general direction.”

  “Maybe if I tried once more to talk some sense to him—”

  “And throw away your edge? The little bastard’s paying us back for our help by planning to murder us! I hardly think we owe him any favors!”

  “Murder is the word I was groping for. I can’t just shoot a seventeen-year-old boy down in cold blood.”

  “Such sentiment does you dubious credit. I said I’d do it. Where is he now, up on the other lookout?”

  The American knew his newfound comrade made sense, but he knew he had to look at himself in the mirror the next time he shaved, too. So he shook his head and said, “There must be a better way. Maybe if we simply ditched them without warning. We could suddenly mount up and ride out, leaving them here on foot. They could walk across the playa to the next town in one night.”