Deadly Trail Read online

  “I don’t know,” Layne’s father said. “Denver, Colorado, is a long way to go.”

  “Nonsense, by train she can be there in less than a week,” Layne’s mother said.

  “Oh, yes, I would love to go,” Layne said enthusiastically. “Father, please say that it is all right.”

  Layne’s father frowned for a moment, then he smiled and nodded.

  “Of course it is all right,” he said. “But you will be on your own for a long time so please, be very careful.”

  “I shall be, Father, I promise,” Layne said.

  Sangre de Cristo Mountains

  “Boys, we’ve got ’em!” Staley said, looking around the area to which they had tracked the men they were chasing. “I’ve been here before. This here is a dead-end canyon. There ain’t no way out of here ’ceptin’ to come back this way. We got ’em trapped!”

  Sheriff Craig stopped at the mouth of the canyon and took a drink from his canteen while he studied the canyon.

  “Staley is right, this is a dead-end canyon, all right,” Craig said. “The question is, do Strayhorn and his men know that it is a dead end? If they know, why would they go into it?”

  “Why would they go into it?” Staley replied. “Easy, they don’t know it’s a dead end.”

  “But what if they do know?” Craig asked.

  “All right, maybe they do know. But maybe they figure we wouldn’t count on them going into a dead-end canyon like this.”

  “Or maybe they figure to draw us in so they can set up an ambush for us,” Craig suggested.

  “So what if that is their plan?” Staley asked. “What are we going to do, just let them stay in there? I mean, come on, there are only four of them, there are ten of us. I figure that, no matter what they have planned, we can handle it.”

  Craig hooked his canteen back onto the pommel and pulled his rifle from the saddle holster, then jacked a round into the chamber.

  “All right,” he said. “Let’s play this hand out.” He started walking into the canyon, leading his horse.

  The others followed, the horses’ hooves falling sharply on the stone floor, then echoing back loudly from the canyon walls.

  “If they are in here, we damn sure ain’t sneakin’ up on ’em, are we?” one of the others said nervously.

  “If you’re afraid, you can always go back, Mitchell,” Staley said.

  “I didn’t say nothin’ ’bout bein’ afraid,” Mitchell replied sharply.

  “Brass band,” Craig said quietly.

  “What? What’s that you say?” Staley asked.

  Craig sighed. “I was thinking about something Matt Jensen told me about posses. He said you may as well have a brass band with you.”

  “I don’t understand,” Staley said.

  “You wouldn’t,” Craig replied.

  The canyon made a forty-five-degree turn to the left just in front of him, so Craig held up his hand as a signal for all to stop.

  “What are we stopping for?” Staley asked.

  “If they’re waiting for us, this is where they’ll be,” Craig replied.

  “Hell, there’s one good way to find out,” Staley said. He slapped his horse on the rump and sent it on ahead. The horse broke into a gallop, the staccato beat of the hooves echoing back to them.

  When the sound of the hooves stopped, the canyon was very quiet once more, the only sound being the whisper of the wind through the canyon.

  “There’s nobody there,” Staley said. “If there was, they would’a shot at my horse.”

  “They have to be here,” one of the other riders said. “We found their tracks goin’ in, but not comin’ out. And you said yourself, there’s only one way in and out.”

  “If you want to know what I think, I think they are up at the far end, trying to climb out. Like I said, we’ve got ’em trapped. Come on, let’s go.”

  Without waiting for Sheriff Craig, Staley moved around the bend in the canyon. Suddenly, the canyon exploded with the sound of gunfire, the sound of the shooting greatly amplified by the confines of the canyon. The missiles raised sparks as they hit the rocky ground, then careened off into empty space, echoing and reechoing in a cacophony of whines and shrieks.

  Staley went down.

  “Staley’s hit!” Mitchell said.

  “Keep me covered, I’m going after him,” Sheriff Craig said.

  “Keep you covered? Keep you covered how?” Mitchell asked.

  “Move up to the edge here and start shooting,” Craig said.

  The rest of the posse moved up to the edge of the canyon and started shooting up toward the canyon walls. For the next minute, it sounded like a full scale battle, the canyon not only amplifying the sounds of shooting, but multiplying it many times over by the echoes that bounced from wall to wall.

  Sheriff Craig moved toward Staley. He saw Staley moving.

  “How bad are you hit?” he called.

  “In my leg,” Staley called back, his voice strained with pain.

  “Turn over on your belly and try to crawl toward me,” Craig called.

  Staley did so, then started wriggling forward on his belly. Bullets hit all around him and Craig, but neither of them were hit. Finally, he got close enough to Craig that Craig was able to reach out and pull him behind the relative safety of a large outcropping of rocks.

  As the shooting continued, Craig and Staley, able to stand now because of the rocks, moved back to join the others, Staley supported on his wounded leg by Craig.

  “Bartlett’s been hit,” Mitchell reported when Craig got back.

  “How bad?” Craig asked.

  “He’s dead,” one of the others said.

  “Anyone else hit?”

  “No, but we’re all goin’ to be killed if we stay here any longer,” Mitchell said. “I say we get out of here.”

  “No need to do that,” Craig said. “Like Staley said, we have them trapped in there. All we have to do is wait them out.”

  “Wait them out? How are we going to do that? We got, what, two more days of food and water?” Mitchell asked.

  “What do you think they have?” Craig replied.

  “Who knows what they have? They could have a month’s supply of food and water hidden up there for all we know. I mean, why else would they come into a canyon that they know is dead end? I think they was just settin’ a trap for us.”

  “I think Mitchell is right,” one of the others said. “I mean, you’re a sheriff, you get paid for this. But I drive a wagon. It ain’t my job to risk my life, and I ain’t a’goin’ to do it. I’m goin’ back home.”

  “Yeah, me too. I work at the livery,” another said. “I don’t get paid for this. I think we should all go home and let the law handle this.”

  “Funny,” Craig said. “I thought we were the law.”

  “You might be the law, but we ain’t,” Mitchell said. “We’re just a bunch of clerks and workers, that’s all. It would’a been good if we could’a got ’em, but there’s no way we’re goin’ to do that now. And Staley has to get back to a doctor.”

  Craig sighed. “Yeah,” he finally said. “All right, get mounted. We’ll go back.”

  “I ain’t got nothin’ to ride,” Staley said. “My horse didn’t come back.”

  Ride Bartlett’s horse, he won’t need it,” Craig suggested.

  “What about Bartlettt? We goin’ to just leave him here?” Mitchell asked.

  “We’ll tie him on behind Staley,” Craig said.

  Cuchara, Colorado

  When the posse rode out of Cuchara a week earlier, they had been confident and determined, cheered on by the people of the town. But when the posse returned, they were defeated and dispirited, showing the effects of exhaustion, cold weather, and even hunger. Several of the citizens of the town saw the blood on Staley’s leg. Others, knowing the makeup of the posse as it left, now put together the fact that the man thrown over the horse behind Staley was Barlett, and that he was probably dead.

  The posse brok
e up the moment they came into town and most went individually to their homes. Staley went straight to the doctor’s office, while Craig took Bartlett’s body to the undertaker. After making arrangements for him, Craig rode on down to the sheriff’s office.

  Matt was holding a cup of hot coffee, and he handed it to Craig the moment the sheriff came into the office.

  “Thanks,” Craig said. He took a big swallow of the coffee, then set the cup on his desk as he removed his coat. He had a week’s growth of beard, and he ran his hand across the stubble. “They got Bartlett,” he said. “I’m going to have to ride out to his ranch and tell his widow.”

  “I don’t envy you that,” Matt said.

  “I should have listened to you,” Craig said. Picking up the coffee again, he sat down behind his desk. “It was just like you said. We couldn’t have announced our presence any more if we had hired criers to go in front of us. They were waiting for us when we got to Wahite Canyon. They killed Bartlett and they shot Staley.”

  “And the outlaws? What happened to them?”

  Craig shook his head. “Who knows? They could be in Mexico by now, for all I know,” he said. “My . . . posse . . . lost its enthusiasm.” He set the word posse apart sarcastically.

  “When you are tracking someone like that, the element of surprise is always your strongest ally,” Matt said. “But surprise is damn near impossible with a posse.”

  “Any trouble while we were gone?”

  Matt shook his head. “Nothing,” he said.

  “Well, thank God for that at least. After a week like I’ve just been through, I would hate to come home to something new. I appreciate your sitting in for me while I was gone.”

  “I didn’t mind it,” Matt said. He took the badge from his shirt and laid it on the desk in front of Sheriff Craig.

  Craig looked at the badge, but he didn’t pick it up. “You know, Matt, that badge is yours for as long as you want it.”

  “I appreciate that,” Matt said. He stretched. “I really do. But I think I’ll be moving on.”

  “Moving on to where?”

  “I don’t know,” Matt said. Then he smiled. “Maybe Denver.”

  “Denver? What’s in Denver?”

  “Apple pie,” Matt said.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “There is a place in Denver called Vi’s Pies. The lady who owns it, Vivian McCain, makes the best apple pie in the world. I’m going to go have a piece.”

  For a long moment, Sheriff Craig looked at Matt as if he didn’t understand. Then, he laughed out loud.

  “By damn,” he said. “What a life you lead, Matt, that you can just pull up stakes and go a hundred miles away for no reason other than to have a piece of pie.” He laughed again. “Damn, if I weren’t married and didn’t have this job, I’d go with you.”

  Wahite Canyon

  Hennessey was laughing as he watched the posse ride away. “Son of a bitch!” he said. “Son of a bitch!” He slapped his leg with his hand. “You was right.”

  “So, you’ve changed your mind, have you?” Strayhorn said. “Coming into a dead-end canyon wasn’t the dumbest thing you ever heard of?”

  Hennessey shook his head. “I never would’a thought it,” he said. “I mean, I figured for sure we’d be trapped in here, but they come in like sittin’ ducks, just like you said they would.”

  “Strayhorn is a smart man,” Teech said. “You’re better off with him than you were with Boone Parker.”

  “Yeah,” Hennessey said. “I got to admit, I don’t think ole Boone would’a thought of anything like this. Course, it don’t matter none now nohow, seein’ as ole Boone is pushin’ up daisies.”

  “Let’s go,” Strayhorn said. “I want to be outta here before they decide to come back.”

  “Where are we goin’?” Taylor asked.

  “Dorena,” Strayhorn answered.

  “Who is Dorena?” Hennessey asked.

  “Dorena ain’t a who,” Teech said. “Dorena is a town. A very special town.”

  “What’s so special about it?”

  “You’ll see.”

  Chapter Eight

  Dorena, New Mexico Territory

  Dorena was a very small town. The small adobe buildings that housed the mostly Mexican residents were either in total darkness, or barely illuminated by burning embers of mesquite wood or fat-soaked rags, because few could afford candles, and fewer still kerosene lanterns.

  The outlaws passed a sign that announced the town.

  YOU ARE ENTERING

  DORENA

  We’ve got our own Law.

  We don’t need none of yours.

  The town had only one street, with a few leaning shacks constructed from rough-hewn lumber, the unpainted wood turning gray and splitting. There was no railroad serving the town, and no signs of the outside world greeted them. It was a self-contained little community, inbred and festering.

  Strayhorn had been here many times before, and so had Teech, but this was the first time for Hennessey and Taylor.

  “And you say this town has got no law?” Hennessey asked as they rode into town.

  “Oh, it’s got law, alright,” Strayhorn said.

  “It’s got law? Then, what the hell are we doin’ here? What if they’ve got word on our jail break?”

  Teech laughed. “It ain’t that kind of law,” he said.

  Hennessey shook his head. “Then I don’t understand. What kind of law are you talkin’ about?”

  “It’s a law we make among ourselves,” Strayhorn said. He headed his horse toward a building that sported a big red sign that said simply:

  SALOON

  “Hah,” Taylor said. “I don’t think I ever seen a saloon that didn’t have no name.”

  “This one has a name,” Strayhorn said as they swung down from their horses. “It’s called Saloon. What more do you need?”

  “How long are we goin’ to be here?” Hennessey asked.

  “As long as I say we are,” Strayhorn answered. “Unless you have a hankerin’ to ride out on your own.”

  “No. You’re the one came to save my ass,” Hennessey said. “I reckon I’ll see what you have in mind.”

  “What I have in mind is twenty-five thousand dollars,” Strayhorn said.

  “What?” Hennessey replied, practically shouting the word.

  Strayhorn laughed. “I thought that might get your attention,” he said. “I didn’t rescue you just ’cause I’m a good guy. I rescued you because I need you and the others to help me pull this off.”

  “What is it? A bank?”

  “No,” Strayhorn said. “It’s better than a bank. It’s like two banks in one. Next week the Midnight Flyer of the Denver and Rio Grande is going to be carrying twenty-five thousand dollars to be deposited in two different banks.” Strayhorn smiled, then held his hand out and rubbed his fingers together. “But the only transfer is to be into our pockets,” he said.

  The others laughed.

  “So, to answer your question, Hennessey, as to how long we are going to stay here—we are going to stay here until that transfer is made.”

  “And you say that will be sometime next week?” Hennessey asked.

  Strayhorn nodded. “Unless you have some other idea.”

  “No, no, your idea is fine with me,” Hennessey replied.

  Strayhorn nodded. “Good. I thought you might see it my way.”

  “My only question is, what are we supposed to do until next week?” Hennessey asked. “Neither me nor Taylor has got a penny to our name.”

  “That’s your problem, it ain’t mine,” Strayhorn replied. “I didn’t take you to raise. I got you out of jail—the rest is up to you.” He smiled. “All I’m askin’ is for you to meet me here in the saloon next Tuesday.”

  “Where will we stay till then? What will we eat?” Taylor asked.

  “See Boomer,” Teech suggested.

  “Who’s Boomer?”

  “Boomer owns the saloon. He’s nearly always g
ot some job to do. And if he likes you, he’ll lend you some money until you do the job. At least enough to eat on.”

  There were no hotels in Dorena, and no restaurants except for the food served in the American saloon or the Mexican cantina. The influx of lawless Americans, however, did create a market for whores, and this market was served by American soiled doves who worked out of the single American saloon in the town. Most of the women had aged beyond their prime so that they could no longer make a decent living in the whorehouses and bars of the more Anglo cities. But because there were so few American prostitutes here, they could still command a good price.

  There were also Mexican women who were engaged in the trade, and most of them operated out of their own houses. In many cases, the Mexican whores had children who were comfortable with the knowledge that their mother was a puta, because they knew of no other existence. Most of the customers of the putas were American, some attracted to the women because of their dusky beauty, others because the Mexican women cost only one half of what the Americans were charging.

  Strayhorn was one who frequented the Mexican putas, and after he left the others, he went straight to the house of Frederica Arino, a puta he had visited many times before. Strayhorn was also a brutal man who enjoyed hurting, and often left the women whimpering in pain when he finished. The Anglo whores would not put up with that, but the Mexican putas just gritted their teeth and bore it in silence.

  Maria Arino, fourteen years old, was used to having men visitors in the tiny house she occupied with her mother, two younger brothers, and baby sister. She felt no shame for her mother. She realized that it was a means of making a living for all of them. But when a man like Strayhorn called, Maria was sometimes frightened. She didn’t like the way he treated her mother, and she didn’t like the way he looked at her.

  A gaily decorated blanket hung from a rope that divided the house into two rooms. On the other side of the blanket, Maria could hear the squeaking of the rope and wood-frame bed, the gurgling grunts of the Anglo, and the barely controlled whimpers of pain of her mother.