Hanging in Wild Wind

Darkness had fallen across the badland hills by the time Paco and Two Horses rode back into the clearing among brush and rock where Silva Ceran and the others had made camp. On the perimeters of the camp, three riflemen stood watch, each from a hidden position. As Paco and Two Horses rode in, keeping their animals at a slow walk, Jenkins stepped forward as if out of nowhere.

“Who the hell is this, Paco?” he asked from the shadows, his rifle in hand. He looked up at Trueblood, who sat slumped, riding double behind Two Horses.

“Jesus,” said Jenkins, staring at the dark blood and thick rawhide stitches across Trueblood’s forehead.

“It is a long story,” said Paco, “and I only want to tell it once.” He nudged his horse on beside Two Horses until they both stopped a few feet back from a large, glowing fire.

Jenkins walked along beside the riders toward the fire. “Who cut him up so bad?” he asked, staring up at the slumped Trueblood, whose eyes were half closed against the throbbing pain in his tightly stitched forehead and abdomen.

Paco jerked his head toward Two Horses. “The Injun cut him all to hell before I recognized him.” Paco spit, and kept himself from grinning. “The poor sonsabitch was trying to find us and got himself mistook.”

Paco stared down at him. “What you don’t want to do, Jenkins, is take advantage of my friendly nature. I told you I don’t want to have to keep repeating myself, like some kind of damned idiot. I’ll tell you when I tell Ceran.”

“Tell me what?” said Ceran, standing up from beside the fire and walking over, slinging coffee grounds from his tin cup. A few feet behind him, Quintos also stood and walked forward, toward Two Horses, who sat with the wounded gunman behind him.

Paco and Two Horses stopped their animals a few feet from Ceran. Trueblood swayed in place and muttered painfully under his breath.

Paco continued, saying, “That we found the man who was on Bloody Wolf’s trail. It’s Delbert Trueblood.” As he spoke he reached over, took Trueblood by his shoulder as if to assist him down from behind Two Horses’ saddle. But before Trueblood could turn to dismount, Paco gave a yank and turned him loose, letting him fall heavily to the rocky ground.

“It was a slip,” Paco said. He stared down at Trueblood and said, “Are you all right, pal? I hope I didn’t save your life out there in order to watch you break your neck.”

“You don’t look all right,” Jenkins commented, taking note of the thick rawhide stitches running the width of his forehead, the same crude stitch work crisscrossing his chest and stomach. “You’ve been cut all to hell.”

“You think . . . I need you to tell me that?” Trueblood said angrily. He jerked his forearm away from Jenkins and looked at Ceran, who stood staring with an air of impatience.

Unsure of how much he should reveal, Trueblood gestured toward the darkness behind them and said, “She’s back there, with Andy Weeks. As far as I know.”

“With Andy Weeks? As far as you know?” Ceran stared at him curiously, trying to determine if there was any sort of implication being made. He drummed his fingertips on the butt of the big Colt holstered on his hip.

“We—we got split up, Silva,” said Trueblood, knowing one false word would get his head shot off. He looked all around, then touched his fingers carefully to the thick rawhide stitches. He said to Ceran in a lowered tone, “Can I . . . get some coffee? Then the two of us can talk somewhere in private.”

Before answering Trueblood, Ceran looked up at Paco and Two Horses. “Good work, both of yas,” he said. “Now break away. Get yourselves some grub and coffee.”

“What about Trueblood being cut all to hell? Are we going to stand for that?” Jenkins asked Ceran, giving Two Horses a cold, hard stare.

Quintos nodded in agreement, observing the long, tightly stitched gashes running across Trueblood’s head and abdomen. “Two Horses, good warrior,” he said. Seeing that Ceran wanted to be left alone with Trueblood, he turned and walked away, around the fire to where his warriors and Comancheros stood watching.

Trueblood held his tongue to keep from issuing a string of curses against Two Horses, although he knew the warrior had only done as he was told by Paco. When the other men saw Ceran give them a questioning look, they turned away. The wounded gunman started straight toward the fire, where a coffeepot sat steaming on a bed of glowing coals. But Ceran gave him a shove, redirected him away from the fire and said, “Start talking. You might not be needing any coffee this night.”

Trueblood caught the threat in Ceran’s voice as he stumbled out of the glowing light and away from the rest of the men. He fell to the ground and looked up at Ceran, who loomed over him. “Silva, I’ve done nothing wrong, I swear to God I haven’t!”

Ceran’s Colt slipped easily from its holster, cocked and leveled toward Trueblood’s stitched forehead. “Where’s Kitty? Where’s Weeks and Wheeler? What went on in Wild Wind?”

“Damn it, Silva, please don’t kill me,” Trueblood pleaded, his mind still working on how to explain things to the outlaw leader. He cowered with a forearm raised, as if to protect himself. “I don’t have nothing but bad news. That’s why I didn’t want to say it in front of the others. I didn’t want to tell you, for fear you’ll kill me for just knowing about it.”

“Okay, Wheeler is dead,” Trueblood said. “A lawman rode into Wild Wind and blew him to hell and was gone before the rest of us could do anything to stop him.”

Trueblood breathed a sigh of relief. “We didn’t know how many lawmen were there,” he lied, “so Weeks and Kitty and me cut out. We got separated in the badlands. I lost my horse when it broke its damned leg.”

“I don’t know—ten or twelve miles,” said Trueblood, feeling better now that it appeared Ceran believed him. With the ranger on their trail, he knew it was a good possibility Kitty had been captured and was on her way out of the badlands in cuffs—better yet, maybe she was shot and killed, he thought. But he would settle for caught and dragged out of the badlands. That would keep Ceran from ever knowing what had happened out there.

“It was Kitty’s idea that we split up,” Trueblood continued. “She said it’s what you would have wanted us to do, so we did. I hope you ain’t angry over it.”

Without answering right away Ceran considered things. He wasn’t too disturbed over Wheeler being killed. In fact, he was glad it happened before they sat down and took their cut of the Poindexter robbery money.

“Are you? Angry, that is.” Trueblood ventured, wanting to feel out the explosive gunman, see how much lying he needed to do.

“Before Wheeler died, did you find out anything about the Chicago mining company setting up a place in Wild Wind?” he asked, still without answering Trueblood’s question.

“Only what I learned from old Emilio, the cantina owner,” said Trueblood. “He said they’re raising a building right now to house the valuables. He said it’ll be part bank depository, part ore-hauling operation until they can build a rail spur across the badlands.”

“Across the badlands—ha,” Ceran scoffed. “I have dreamed for something like this my whole thieving life,” he chuckled. “When does all this happen?”

“It’s happening now,” said Trueblood. “The building is being built. There could be silver ore and cash money there almost any time.”

“Yeah, there could,” Ceran said, getting a wistful look to his eyes as he thought of the possibilities awaiting him. “Did you and Weeks and Wheeler check out what the old man told you before Wheeler got shot, or was you all three too busy chasing whores and drinking whiskey?”

“All right, I ain’t going to lie to you, Silva,” said Trueblood. “We did get us some whiskey drunk and we was getting our bells rung when the lawmen slipped into Wild Wind on us. But everything the old man told us must be true. I saw enough that I believe him.”

For a second, in Ceran’s greed he’d almost forgotten about Kitty and Weeks. But then he snapped his stare back to Trueblood. Looking at the thick, reddened stitches on his head and abdomen, he said, “All right. Get yourself some coffee, and grub if you’re able to eat. As soon as you’re full, get yourself a horse from one of the renegades’ spares.”

“We’re all going,” said Ceran. “We’re riding back and finding Kitty and Weeks.” His eyes riveted onto Trueblood’s. “That’s not going to raise any problems, is it?”

“No. Hell no,” Trueblood said quickly. “The sooner, the better. I want to find them just as bad as you do. I mean, hell, they’re two of our own. We got to find them before the law gets to them.”

“That’s the spirit,” said Ceran, studying him closely as he gestured a sweeping arm toward the fire, inviting Trueblood toward the coffeepot.

Jesus. That murdering bitch . . . , Trueblood thought, hoping the ranger had blown Kitty Dellaros’ brains out somewhere on the badlands.

The ranger and Kitty Dellaros had taken the trail that cut across a hill line and a long stretch of flatlands toward Wild Wind. From a cliff ledge inside the hills, Sam lay eyeing the vast, empty flatlands through his telescope before venturing down onto the harsh terrain. Standing off to the side, Kitty Dellaros wet a bandana from a canteen of tepid water and touched it to her hot, dust-streaked face.

“We did,” Sam replied over his shoulder, still scanning with the telescope as he spoke. “But Bloody Wolf’s renegades don’t have these badlands all to themselves.”

“Let’s see . . . ,” Sam said, as if giving the matter some serious contemplation. “There’s Mexican bandits . . . American bandits. Runaway Apache. Comadrejas—desert weasels. A few other assorted saddle tramps, killers, lunatics . . .”

“Well, then,” Kitty said cynically, “lucky for them, they won’t have to worry about running into Ranger Sam Burrack. Will they?”

“That’s right,” Sam said, not letting her words get to him. He wasn’t going to tell her that he’d spotted a freight wagon sitting with a broken wheel just at the edge of a short, spiky hill line. She would find out once they got there, he decided. “Mount up,” he said, collapsing the telescope between his gloved hands.

“When will we be back in Wild Wind?” she asked. “I can’t believe it’s taking so long going this way.” She fanned herself with the wet bandana. “Are you sure you haven’t gotten us lost?”

For the past two miles he’d noticed that she’d become more talkative again—more talkative, more taunting and more high-strung. These were traits he’d recognized each time prior to her making another attempt at escape. She had settled down at the sight of the renegades. But now that they no longer posed a threat, and now that the two of them were drawing closer to Wild Wind and closer to the possibility of her freedom being taken from her, he knew she would make some desperate move on him at any time.

“There’s no point in me wasting my breath trying to reason with you again, is there?” she asked out of the blue.

Yep, that cinched it, he told himself. She was about to try something. He’d better be ready for it. Running her options through his mind, he realized there was nothing left for her to do but try to make a hard run for it across the rocky flatlands. She was unarmed; she had learned that she wasn’t going to get the drop on him, take him by surprise the way he figured she’d taken down Andy Weeks. Outrunning him was all she had left.

He knew he could catch her easy enough. The horse she was riding was no contest for Black Pot. But there was more to consider. This was rugged terrain. He didn’t want to risk injuring the stallion in a race across treacherous ground.

“We’d be foolish to wear these animals out and have to walk the last miles into town,” he said quietly.

“What?” she asked, looking around at him quickly, his quiet tone of voice having caught her by surprise. She watched him draw his Winchester from its saddle boot and prop it up on his thigh.

“Even with the renegades behind us, we’d be in trouble if they happened back this way and came upon us afoot,” he said. “So, keep it in mind that I’m not going to chase you.” He levered a round into the rifle chamber, making sure she heard it.

“For God’s sake, Ranger,” she said. “Is that all you think about—me trying to escape?” She gave him a feigned look of shock and disgust. Her real shock was that he seemed to have just then read her mind. She had been on the verge of nailing her oversized boot heels to the horse’s sides and making a run for it. Now she realized it would be useless. And he was right: this was no place to be on winded or injured horses. Damn. Now what? She asked herself, looking all around as if in defeat.

Would he actually shoot me? She wondered. He hadn’t offered her a close enough look inside him to allow her to know what he might or might not do. She prided herself on reading men. But this one was not an easy study. This one didn’t play along enough to let himself be seen. Damn it to hell. . . .

Sam had drawn Black Pot back a step behind her, keeping a close watch on her until he saw her slump ever so slightly in her saddle. The move was genuine, he told himself. She had considered her chances, then changed her mind. Maybe she was starting to understand that he was not out here to either play or be played with—only to do a job.