Stand Up and Die

“Likely there be whiskey there,” Sean Keegan said with a grin, and wet his chapped lips.

“More likely it would kill you,” Breen said.

“Many a bottle and many a keg have tried, Breen, me lad,” the Irishman said with a laugh. “But nary a one has been bad enough to finish off Sean Keegan.”

Under most circumstances, Matt McCulloch would have avoided the place. It had that feel about it, but the signs all said that the wayfarers had stopped there for a night. The man peering from the open doorway in this post of some sort likely had entertained one or more of the braver souls in the train.

That would not have meant anything to McCulloch either, but Wooden Arm had signed and spoken that whoever had been following the wagon train had ridden up to that miserable hut of mostly dirt, at least a day before the wagon train had arrived.

“Stay here,” McCulloch finally said, swung into his saddle, and began riding toward the post.

“Matt,” Keegan called. “I think you might need someone to back your—”

“Stay put. Don’t forget those men trailing us. I’ll be back.”

Keegan frowned and turned to Breen. “What the bloody hell has gotten into him? He must think he’s the guardian angel of those damned fool pilgrims making their way west.”

Breen grinned and shrugged. “Once a lawman . . .”

“Two days ago he said we’d kill those hombres trailing us, yet here we are, and they’re still somewhere behind us, waiting to make their play.”

“Matt’s conservative,” Breen said. “Takes him a while to make up his mind when it comes to doing something like that.” He started to tighten the cinch on his saddle. “I’d say that among us jackals, he has the least jackal in him.”

“And that’s his biggest failing,” Keegan said.

McCulloch had reached the trading post, so Keegan drew the Springfield from his scabbard, and began moving to where he could have a good view of the open doorway.

“Matt said . . .” Breen started.

“Aye,” Keegan said as he found a rock to brace the heavy rifle against, and aimed through the doorway. “But as ye pointed out, laddie, Matt ain’t the jackal that you and I be. He needs a guardian angel, even if it’s a jackal like me.”

* * *

The big brute of a man sat at a table, reading a newspaper with a cigarette burning in what passed for an ash tray and a stoneware jug, uncorked, at his right elbow.

“Hola,” McCulloch said.

The man’s dark eyes looked over the paper, then he turned a page.

“Looking for some information about that wagon train.”

Without looking at him this time, the man said, “No sabe.”

“You’re reading an American newspaper. Printed in English. From”—McCulloch tilted his head for a better view—“Arkansas.”

“No sabe,” the man said again, let the paper drop to the table, and found his jug. Cradling it in the crook of his arm, he drank, burped, and set the jug down to take a few puffs on his cigarette.

McCulloch repeated his statement in Spanish.

That made the big man’s eyes harden. “¿Eres la policía?”

“I am justice,” McCulloch answered in English.

The man laughed and rose, revealing his towering height and muscular body. He was like the biggest strongman at a circus McCulloch had ever seen. Hell, he was bigger than some circuses McCulloch had ever seen.

“Amigo,” the man said, switching to English, “There is no law in this part of the territory except the law that Don Marion Wilkes establishes.” His heavy accent made it hard to understand, but McCulloch caught the gist of it. If the words were not clear, the big man made his point when he smashed the jug against a column post that helped keep the dirty roof from caving in on them. Then he turned the sharp edges of the busted vessel toward the former Ranger.

“Now you don’t want to do that, son,” McCulloch said with a smile. His hand rested on the handle of the Colt.

“I will kill you now,” the big monster said in broken English. “That will make Don Marion Wilkes very happy.”

McCulloch pulled the Colt, aimed it, cocked it. Less than three feet separated them.

“All I want is information. Like why were those men following that train? And who the hell is Don Marion Wilkes?”

“You will find your answers, amigo.” The man turned the table over.

Nothing separated the two men but the centipede that scurried across the floor, trying its best to get out of the way of the brawl that was about to start.

“In Hell,” the man lunged toward McCulloch.

The pistol roared, bathing the miserable hut in white smoke and deafening the Ranger’s ears. He stepped to his right and back, but to his amazement, the big man still stood. How the hell could I have missed? McCulloch thought.

The Mexican brute even grinned and started toward the gringo again. When McCulloch pulled the trigger a second time, he knew with all certainty that he had not missed, and that his weapon had not misfired.

Smoke rose from the man’s muslin shirt—that’s how close the Colt’s barrel was to the giant’s body—and McCulloch saw the hole the heavy slug had punched through the coarse shirt. He also saw a hole two inches above where the Colt’s first bullet had struck.

The leviathan said something in Spanish, but McCulloch could not hear for his ears rang with thunder and the blood rushing to his head.

“I do not die,” the monster said in English, laughed, and lifted the broken jug over his head. His laughter turned into a deep-voiced howl.

When the big man took his first step, McCulloch’s left hand fanned back the hammer, and the Colt roared again. Keeping his finger squeezing the trigger, McCulloch fanned the hammer, and kept shooting, while he backed up until he was to the right of the doorway. Three more rounds, and then the hammer fell on an empty chamber, though McCulloch heard nothing but the dull explosions from the Colt.

The brutal man still stood, laughing, and while his right hand kept the busted jug over his head, he used his left to rip away the front of the smoldering, bullet-riddled shirt. McCulloch saw what kept the man on his feet, kept him alive. Beneath the shirt he wore a wooden undershirt, and beneath the wood, McCulloch figured there was a steel plate. On the other side of the heavy plate, more wood, and perhaps some wool or cotton just to make it a tad more comfortable.

Bringing the Colt back over his head, hitting the dirty wall, McCulloch prepared to hurl the revolver at the massive monster’s head—like that would save his hide—and then maybe he could dive through the doorway and run like hell.

He saw the brute’s mouth open as if to speak or laugh, but no words, no noise came out of his mouth, At that moment something entered the mouth of the Mexican, cut his tongue, and blew out a large portion of the back of the killer’s head. Blood and brains splattered the wall and the man fell wordlessly onto the dirt. That jarred the building so much that sand began pouring from the roof, followed by stones, branches, thatch, and the nest of a pack rat.

McCulloch could hear nothing but the ringing, yet he knew the roof was collapsing, and he turned and staggered outside, still clutching the empty revolver. Dust and smoke poured out of the opening as he stumbled toward the rails of the corral near the miserable building.

He was still there when Keegan joined him. McCulloch could hear the Irishman whistling. Good, the old Ranger thought, that means I’m not stone deaf.

“What happened?” Keegan asked.

Shaking his head, McCulloch said, “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.” He saw the Springfield in Keegan’s hands. “Reckon I ought to thank you.”

“Not me,” Keegan said. “Breen. Mine’s still loaded. I just came to help you. Left Jed back there with his Colt to make sure our mustangers stay put. I figured I could make that shot, but, hell, Jed’s Sharps has that fancy scope.”

The north wall caved in.

“There goes the crypt,” Keegan said. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

“Not yet,” McCulloch said. He waved Wooden Arm over to read the signs from the corral.

* * *

The desert stretched before them, distant hills—Navajo country—and buttes to the north, red sand and red rocks beyond. The stagecoach road dipped south, yet wagon tracks kept moving west.

Wooden Arm shrugged. Keegan spit tobacco juice. The mustangs snorted.

“Why would they go west?” McCulloch asked. “They’re not lost. They’d been following the road all this way since they struck it, same as us.”

“Didn’t ye say that Mex was reading a newspaper from Arkansas?” Keegan asked, and when McCulloch nodded, he explained. “Well, have ye ever met any gent from that state that had any lick of sense?”

“My mother came from Arkansas,” McCulloch said.

Keegan wiped his mouth. “Like ye ever had a mother, Matt.” He sighed and pointed. “They probably bought some land in that godforsaken blight of sand and scorn. Suckered, but they are nay our concern, pardner, and we have mustangs—your mustangs—to get to the army. That means following the stagecoach road.”

After kicking a clod of dirt, McCulloch swung into his saddle. “It doesn’t make any sense. What’s ahead, between here and the crossing of the Colorado River?”

“I dunno, Matt.” Keegan stared ahead, then back at the approaching mustangs and covered wagon. “More of the same. Dead River, I believe, is a bit—”

“Dead River?” McCulloch stared intently.

“Aye. Though I don’t think in my few scouts in this bad country if ever I saw a spot of water. Even after a whale of a monsoon.” Keegan cocked his head. “Is something troubling ye, Matt?”

“Dead River,” he whispered. “Just triggered something in the back of my head. Can’t place it right now. But I think it was a dream I had.”

“I haven’t had a decent dream since the one of Peggy O’Doul, fine blond-headed gal, sweet lass . . .”

McCulloch pulled off his hat and waved it toward Jed Breen, who was riding point.

“Keep them moving west,” McCulloch yelled. “Straight ahead. Don’t let them turn south. We’re riding this way.” Spurring his horse, he galloped down the north side of the herd, to reach the drag position with Charlotte Platte, to make sure the herd—and this motley outfit of jackals and a woman—rode toward Dead River.

Keegan glanced at Wooden Arm, who smiled like a fool, and awkwardly made it onto the back of his pinto. The boy rode toward the herd of mustangs, too,where Breen was leading them west, away from the road that was the safest way to travel.

“Bloody hell,” Keegan said and even considered crossing himself and saying a prayer.