12

After Slim-Jim left him in the back room alone and went in to inform the others that he had agreed to throw in with the gang, the Rio Kid dragged himself over to a window and looked out the dirty pane, trying to determine the approximate location of the outlaw headquarters.

Bare hills rose steeply outside. They were somewhere in the mountains back from the Border. The thought of making a break for freedom came to him as he stared out at the group of saddled horses standing with dropped reins at the gate of a broken-down corral.

Focusing his eyes on Thunderbolt, who stood with head high and stamping his feet impatiently, he felt a squirming in his midribs to break through the window, leap on his back and ride away as only the black stallion could carry him.

Sensibly, he rejected the thought immediately. Unarmed, he wouldn’t be helping the Mexicans any by escaping. The impatient nerves squirmed again when he was reminded that already the scoundrel, Joe Elliot, was posing as the Navarros’ friend, Steve Fisher, and was worming his way into their confidence. The Mexicans would be safe only as long as it took Joe Elliot to get the secret of the Padres’ gold from them.

If he could reach them in time …

The irony of the situation brought a groan from his puffed, twisted lips. Two Steve Fishers wandering around in the Big Bend … and neither of them the man whom Juliano Navarro could trust with the treasure.

He saw that his only chance to gain their confidence against Joe Elliot was the slight bond of friendship that had formed between Ramon and himself in the outlaws’ cave.

He decided not to present himself to the Mexicans as Steve Fisher when he reached them. He would have to depend upon Ramon to convince his father that he was a friend who could be trusted.

Even if he could turn them against Joe Elliot, there would still be the Colter gang to contend with. As Steve Fisher, they expected him to lead them to the gold, and if he failed, he would be ruthlessly killed.

From the outer room came the sound of loud voices and laughter and the gurgle of liquor into glasses. They were congratulating Slim-Jim on bringing him around to their way of thinking, the Kid told himself wryly.

The sound of maudlin revelry grew louder and more unrestrained. The Kid moved cautiously toward the door and peered out. The four men were gathered around a scarred pine table with several bottles and glasses set out before them. Pete and Pancho and Slim-Jim were drinking heavily, but Lem Colter was cold sober. As the Kid watched them, he knew that Slim-Jim was the most dangerous man among them … the one he would have to watch carefully.

Colter glanced up and saw the Kid framed in the doorway and motioned to him: “C’mon and have a drink, Fisher,” he suggested amiably. “Have two drinks, er a dozen. Jest so you don’t try no funny business, an’ I reckon yuh won’t with the cyards stacked agin yuh like they be.”

“I could use a drink … and some cold water on my face,” the Rio Kid admitted. He advanced toward the table slowly and realized that Slim-Jim was as cold sober as Lem, though he was matching the other two drink for drink. Once or twice in the Kid’s life he had met men like that … men who could drink a crowd of ruffians under the table without showing the slightest effect of drunkenness. It was something inside of them that was stronger than liquor, stronger than any artificial stimulant.

The Kid’s half-aroused hope of effecting an escape after the others were all drunk died at once. With Slim-Jim withstanding the effects of whisky and with the leader of the gang refusing to drink, the two most dangerous members remained to be reckoned with.

Slim-Jim stood up. “I’ll take you around to put some cold water on your bruises. Pancho brought up some cool water from the spring.” His dark intelligent eyes flashed a warning to the Kid, and he understood that any attempt to escape would be fatal.

The Kid felt almost human again after dipping his face again and again in the cold water, blinking his eyes in it until his eyeballs felt cool. He doused water over his hair and combed it with his stiff, sore fingers, then dabbed some of the wetness away with a soiled bandanna.

Back in the house, he picked up a half-full bottle with a harsh laugh and put it to his lips. Before drinking it, he asked Lem Colter:

“When do I see the Navarros? Mebbe I’d better stay sober if I’m ridin’ soon.”

“You ain’t. Not this afternoon. We’ll put you on the trail early in the mawnin’ after Pete an’ Pancho sober up. Pete’s a dead-shot with a rifle an’ he’ll be watchin’ you over rifle sights from the hills just tuh see you don’t git no foolish idees of runnin’ out on us.”

“That bein’ the case,” said the Kid, “I might’s well get drunk too.” He lifted the bottle again, and this time let the hot red liquid gurgle down his throat for a long time without taking it down.

Soon after that things began to get hazy. Consciously and deliberately, he drank himself into stupidity so the time would pass faster. He didn’t want to think about what might be happening to Juliano and Ramon Navarro in the meantime.

In his stupor, he loudly demanded food. Lem Colter set a mess of frijoles on the scarred table. They were warm from the sun and the heat of saddle-bags against horse flesh after the afternoon’s long ride. The Kid ate his fill, then stumbled into the back room and fell down on the oat-sack pallet to sleep soundly.

From long habit, he awoke at dawn the next morning. Pete and Pancho were snoring heavily in one corner of the room, but Lem Colter was sitting at the table drinking a tin cup of coffee, and Slim-Jim’s lithe body was lounging in the doorway, silhouetted against the early morning light.

Lem Colter grinned evilly at the Kid and said, “You better be readyin’ yoreself tuh ride, Fisher. There’s gold in them thar hills beggin’ to be took out.”

The Kid went to the stove and poured himself a cup of coffee, squatted down on his heels with his back against the wall and rolled a cigarette. There was no food in sight, but he felt refreshed and strengthened from a long night’s sleep and the nourishing frijoles of last night.

Slim-Jim went in to waken Pete and Pancho. Lem Colter finished his coffee and went outside. Presently the Kid heard Lem and Slim-Jim arguing as to the procedure of the day, and again, as before, the Kid sensed the strained relations existing between them. And again he sensed that the actual reins of leadership lay in the hands of Slim-Jim, and that Colter did not dare openly force an issue.

After drinking a cup of coffee, Pete and Pancho went out to saddle their horses to ride to their vantage point where they would watch the Kid’s every movement after he was released.

When the sound of their horses faded away, Lem Colter came into the room with the Kid’s two guns held out butt-first.

“Here y’are, Fisher. Holster these forty-fives an’ we’ll be ridin’.”

Slim-Jim was lounging against the wall with a half-smile on his face, low-lidded eyes fixed on the Kid. Colter appeared to be wholly at ease, unconscious of what was impending. He moved briskly to the door and said:

“We better be rid …” he began, but the Kid took a quick step backward and swung the muzzle of his left gun in a short arc to bear down on Slim-Jim, while the other weapon pointed directly at Lem Colter’s belly.

“All right, you two,” the Kid snapped. “I’ll take over now.”

Lem Colter stared at him in pained surprise. “Why, you double-crossin’ rat. Slim-Jim said …”

Slim-Jim laughed aloud. “I said he was going to play it our way, Lem. He is.” He started to move forward, his cold gaze fixed on the Kid’s face.

“Better stop where yo’re at,” the Kid warned softly. “I sorta like you, Slim-Jim, but I’ll blast yore guts if you make me.”

“No, you won’t.” There was a taunting smile on Slim-Jim’s handsome face. “You can’t get us both. If you start throwing lead, one of us will drill you.”

“I’ll risk that.” The Kid’s body slowly sank into a crouch. Forefingers were white against the triggers of both guns. “Don’t come another step.”

Slim-Jim kept coming.

The Kid pulled both triggers, but instead of echoing blasts, there were only two clicks of hammers on empty chambers.

“You fool!” Slim-Jim cried angrily. “Did you think I wouldn’t take the precaution to unload your guns? I know men better than that. I knew you’d shoot it out if you were given half a chance.”

“Well, I’m damned!” Lem Colter ejaculated. “Whyn’t you tell me you’d unloaded them guns, Slim-Jim? I lost ten years offen my life waitin’ for them triggers tuh be pulled.”

The Rio Kid shrugged and holstered his empty guns. “And I was a fool tuh think you mighta slipped up,” he admitted to Slim-Jim. “I’m ready tuh ride.”

“Lem and I will be riding with you,” Slim-Jim explained. “You’ll need a guide up close to the Navarro shack. Just leave your guns in the holsters until Lem and I leave you on the trail … then you can load them from your belt.”

The Kid went out with them silently, and set his jaw in a grim line when Lem Colter motioned to the sorrel he had ridden yesterday and said casually:

“You kin throw yore rig on that nag. I’ve took a fancy to thuh black stud you rode yestiddy. I’m riding him.”

The Kid stubbornly kept his head turned away when Thunderbolt nickered to him as he approached the corral. He quickly roped out the sorrel, threw his saddle on and cinched it with unnecessary roughness.

There would come a time of reckoning, he inwardly vowed, but that time was not yet.

With Slim-Jim in the lead and Lem Colter bringing up the rear on Thunderbolt, they loped down a trail that led away from the deserted old ranch house, following a course that cut across the foothills directly to the spring and the hut beneath the cottonwoods some distance away.

They rode wordlessly, kicking up a cloud of dust in the still air, for more than an hour at a speed that the Kid calculated must have covered at least fifteen miles. Then Slim-Jim pulled his lathered horse to a stop and pointed ahead toward the edge of the blind canyon.

“You’ll find the Navarro shack at the head of that canyon, Fisher. This is as far as Lem and I go. From now on, you’ll be covered by from one to four rifles every move you make. Don’t forget that if you have any ideas. Lead us to the gold and get the Mexicans out of our way so we can move it, and none of you will get hurt. Otherwise …” He shrugged his slim shoulders meaningly.

“Thass right.” From his seat on the prancing and mettlesome Thunderbolt, Lem Colter spoke up quickly. “But I still think we ought to do away with the Mex and his kid.”

“I’m handling this,” Slim-Jim cut in sharply to Colter.

“How about my hawss?” the Kid asked angrily.

“I’m keepin’ him. You’ll be lucky tuh git outta here alive.” There was no mistaking the menace in the bandit’s voice.

The Kid reined his sorrel away and rode down into the canyon, came to the narrow trail along the edge of the stream below, and turned into it. Looping reins over his saddle horn, he reloaded both of his guns as he rode.

He had no definite plan in mind. If Joe Elliot was already with the Navarros, accepted by them as Steve Fisher, he would have to stake everything on Ramon’s friendship. Watched by four riflemen from the rim of the canyon, the situation looked completely hopeless for himself and the Mexicans.

Yet, the Kid rode up to the clump of cottonwoods with hope strong in his heart. Somehow, a way out would be found.

He halted the sorrel fifty feet from the shack and halloed. His voice was echoed back resoundingly, but there was no other answer. There was no sign of life in or around the shack, no smoke rising from the rock chimney.

Spurring the sorrel forward anxiously, the Kid flung himself off and pounded on the hut door … then yanked it open.

A glance inside told him he was too late. A scrap of paper on the packing box table attracted his attention. He stepped inside and looked down at the penciled words:

To The Man Who Wears Two Guns and is Afraid of Nothing. Senor: If you come looking for Ramon before we return, my father and I have gone with Steve Fisher to discover that which we have sought. Follow the trail of the horse and burro over the long ridge, with the marks of my feet in the dust behind them.

Ramon Navarro

Cursing deep in his throat, the Kid grabbed up the scrap of paper and strode out of the cabin. This evidence of the youth’s faith that he would come moved him deeply. It was galling to be too late … to realize that father and son might already be dead, sacrifices on the altar of human greed.

He leaped into the saddle and sent the sorrel charging up the trail to the top where he easily found the hoofprints of horse and burro, with the plain imprints of Ramon’s feet in the dust.

Getting his bearings and picking up the long ridge mentioned in Ramon’s note, the Kid put the sorrel onto the trail in a fast gallop, utterly forgetful of the riflemen who were waiting for him to reappear with the Navarros, forgetful of everything except the probable dire need of the lad who had trusted him not to desert them.

As he rode on the trail of the trio, he became faintly conscious of skulking figures in the brush on either side of him, and he knew that Pete and Pancho were keeping pace with him as they had been ordered by their boss.

That didn’t matter now. He would have time to worry about the Colter gang after he caught up with the Navarros and the man they believed to be Steve Fisher.

His trained eyes picked out the trail ahead as he rode at a headlong gallop. He didn’t see where the boy’s footprints left the trail to go down to the hidden exit from the mine, but his eyes picked up the patient figure of horse and burro long before he reached the edge of the cliff, and he thundered up on them with both guns drawn, dreading what he would find, puzzled when he found nothing but the two animals halted there at the end of the trail.

Flinging himself off, he ran forward to the edge and gazed down in utter bewilderment at the lariat extending down to the narrow ledge below. There was no sign of life, nothing to indicate where any of the trio had vanished to … except that rope dangling off over the edge.

As he knelt there, trying to reconstruct what had happened, trying to decide what he should do, a strange and terrifying cry echoed thinly upward.

A ghastly disembodied wail that seemed to come from nowhere, yet striking a chord in the Rio Kid’s memory and causing him to tremble violently there on the brink of the chasm.

He had heard that same eerie, unnatural cry once before … two nights previously. It was the same cry that had come to him out of the storm to lead him to the cave in the rimrock … and to Ramon Navarro.

It was repeated again and again while the Kid fought back a surge of supernatural awe and tried to discover a realistic origin for the sound.

It seemed to come from below … from that ledge, somehow, and it was more a cry of dire distress than of pain, high and shrill as a woman’s voice.

With a quick glance around at the deserted landscape, the Kid holstered both his guns and swung out over the edge of the chasm on Elliot’s rope just as a rifle shot screamed through the air above him.

Sliding downward swiftly, Ramon’s screams of distress came nearer, more clearly. As he neared the bottom and was looking downward for a foothold, there was a sharp snapping sound above and the rope parted at the edge of the cliff where the sharp rock had frayed through the strands under the weight of three descending bodies.

The Kid tumbled onto the ledge in a heap, tangled in the rope that fell on him, and it was as though a vast megaphone magnified Ramon’s cries and threw them out of the aperture in the rock into his ears.

Disentangling himself, the Kid leaped to his feet and pushed through the screening junipers into the blackness of the tunnel to the rescue of a young girl who faced worse than death in the clutches of a human fiend.