"We're in for a bad one," Evan said to Ben.
"Sure looks like it," Ben replied as he watched the billowing, swirling sandstorm roll menacingly toward them. It was a brown monster filling half the western sky and stretching north and south for miles.
"Better get ready for it." He pulled his hat down more tightly and tied a bandana over his nose and mouth.
"Where's your bandana?" Ben asked, noting Evan's lack of something to filter the dust that would soon be filling the air.
"Don't have one. I'll have to use part of my shirttail." With one lung partially defective, he shouldn't be breathing dust. He pulled his shirt from under his belt and sliced off a strip with his jackknife.
"Best we ride on and try to get out of the storm as quick as we can," Ben said.
"Right." Evan quickly fastened the piece of cloth over his nose and mouth and looked at
Ben. "Let's hurry."
Ben and Evan were a day south of Montezuma and crossing a broad expanse of sand dimes. The westerly wind had been whipping in strongly for hours, stirring the sand and sending it streaming in hundreds of ground currents. The sand skittered along the ground, biting at the ankles of the horses and piling onto the lee sides of the long, curving dunes. Some of the dunes, having been blown before the wind for thousands of years, had strayed beyond their birthplace, migrating off to the east to lap against the rock reef of Sierra Los Arados, a chain of steep, barren hills.
The wind increased to a gale as the front of the sandstorm charged ever closer to the two riders. It leapt the last quarter mile with amazing speed and struck them with a roll of churning brown sand and the wind shrieking a wild song. The blizzard of choking sand stung the men's faces and burned like fire. The sand searched for their eyes, and the men squeezed them down to mere slits. Overhead the yellow sun burned scarlet through the dust.
The horses tried to turn their rumps to the brunt of the storm to protect themselves as best they could from the cutting sand. The riders held tight reins and kept the animals headed south.
* * *
Some two hours after the sandstorm had struck Ben and Evan, they escaped from its slashing onslaught as El Camino Real climbed into a range of hills on its way to Chihuahua. They halted on the crest in clean, clear air and slapped at the dust on their clothing. They opened their canteens and drank water to wash the dust from their throats.
Evan felt the accumulation of dust that had found its way through the cloth and around its edges and into his nostrils. He took a deep breath of air to blow his nose. At the deep intake of air, a searing pain like a knife thrust struck his wounded lung. He clutched at his chest as a series of harsh, body-shaking coughs erupted.
He knew such deep coughing could reopen his old wound. He breathed shallowly, fighting the urge to cough. He managed to hold the next cough to a weaker one. He stopped the next one that was building. Tears came to his eyes with his efforts to subdue it.
Finally Evan straightened. He hawked and spat on the ground.
Seeing the worried expression in Ben's eyes, Evan spoke. "I'm all right now. No blood. I hope Rachel didn't have to go through one of those."
"Bad one, all right," Ben agreed. Evan looked like hell. Ben considered telling him to turn and ride back to the States. But he knew Evan wouldn't do that.
"I'm ready to travel," Evan said, and pulled himself into the saddle.
"Then let's do it."
They rode off along the scarred, ancient road.
Ben looked out across the hills for any sign of a stagecoach and riders. The hills had been stripped of their flesh of soil by wind and water, with nothing left but worn, gray rock. The gray color of the eroded, raw rock made Ben think of a giant pile of old bones every time he rode through them. The only sign that man had passed this way was the scrape marks left on the rock by the passage of iron wheels and iron-shod hooves.
"The road is solid rock for miles," Ben said. "Let's hope our horses don't throw a shoe. One time I had a couple of horses do just that. I was bringing several north and was in a hurry and couldn't stop. Had to kill the one that would bring the least money and use its hide to protect the hoofs of the two who were barefooted."
"Valdes horses, I reckon? And the Valdes men were chasing you."
"Some of them were. I never came this way a second time."
"Why Valdes horses?"
"They're the best. And the Valdes family can spare them when other people can't."
"That makes stealing right?"
"Maybe not right, but okay, since they got most of their wealth by working poor peons like slaves. At least it's right to my way of thinking." Ben didn't bother to mention the battles of the Alamo or Goliad, for Evan would know about those.
"We need water," Evan said. Ben wasn't going to be changed by anything he said. "Is there a ranch or a town close?"
"None that I know about. But I do know where there's water."
* * *
Ben led the way to water at the west base of Gallegos Dos, a dome-shaped hill with a scant growth of desert grass. A third of the way up its flank, one patch of saguaros stood with outstretched arms like a group of lost desert wanderers. For the past mile or so, the two men had been able to see the spring area and knew it was deserted and safe to approach.
They dismounted and led the lathered and exhausted horses up the short, steep slope to the spring. The animals were left to drink at the lower end of the little stream of water that flowed a few yards from the spring before disappearing into the earth. The men lay down where the water came pure out of the rock of the hill and drank.
Evan finally raised his head from the water. "Better-tasting than I'd expected."
"Lava rock makes for good water," Ben said. "No alkali to spoil it."
"This might be a place where we should rest the horses for a little while."
"I was thinking the same thing, for a couple of hours anyway." Ben knew Evan needed rest more than the horses.
As the men staked out the Valdes horses, with Brutus left free, the last of the day burned down to black ash and it was dark. They spread their blankets in the moonless night and fell wearily upon them. The men lay silent and resting, each thinking his own private thoughts.
"Ben, do you think we'll catch up to them before they reach their rancho?" Evan asked.
"I'd sure like to, for that rancho is like a fortress. But I'm beginning to doubt it, for it's now only a little more than three days away and I don't think we've gained much."
"Do you still think that boy racing past us just south of Samalayuca carried a message to Carlos?"
"I do, and Carlos sure as hell knows we're still coming. In fact, he'll have people watching for us and with the system of relay riders the Valdes Company has in place, he'll be able to keep track of us."
"If so, then why hasn't he tried again to stop us?"
"I don't know why he hasn't hit us before now. But you've got to remember that Carlos knows this land and is picking the best place. Maybe tomorrow will be the day. But there's no way we can know until we see them coming. We got to keep a sharp eye out."
Ben knew it was time to tell Evan about Maude. Though unlikely, the Valdes brothers might have been delayed in their journey south. If so, Evan and Ben just might overtake them. Evan needed to know there were two women to rescue.
"I hope both Maude and Rachel are all right."
"What's that you said? Maude? Maude who?"
"Maude Bradshaw."
"Why do you mention her?"
"She could be with the Valdes brothers. She's missing same as Rachel."
"Some girl you know?"
"She's from Canutillo same as me."
"You knew she was missing and could be with the Valdes when I asked you to help me. Is that right?"
"That's right."
"I remember now. You were all packed when I talked to you at the hotel. You were ready to go south after the Valdes brothers then. You tricked me into promising to operate on your face."
"I didn't trick you. You're the one who asked me to help you. We made a deal. Are you going to back out of it?"
"I don't like what you did."
"Well, hell, now that's too bad. Answer my question. Are you backing out? Is your word any good? We need to settle this right now before we go any further together."
"I shook on it and I'll keep it," Evan retorted.
"Good." Ben had made Evan angry by not telling about Maude at the beginning of their journey into Mexico. Still, he was glad that the man knew Maude was most likely with Rachel. Maybe Evan would soon get over his anger. Now they had to catch up with the Valdes brothers and take the women away from them. And make the kidnappers pay the full price.
"Evan, something's been on my mind. You seemed awfully determined to try to get Rachel back Do you plan to marry her?"
"I haven't asked her," Evan said.
"Do you aim to?"
"I'm thinking seriously about doing it."
"Is that why you had to kill Redpath? Because he had slept with her and you want her for a wife?"
"I don't want to talk about that bastard Redpath," Evan said tersely.
"Since I'm helping you get her back, then it seems like a fair question."
"What makes you think she slept with Redpath?"
"From what you told me, especially the part that he deserved to die, and I talked with John Davis. I just put what both of you said together and came up with that answer."
"Whether or not she did is none of your business. And further, you have no right to question me because you'd be going after the Valdes brothers for your own reasons."
After a moment of silence, Ben's voice came low and thoughtful in the darkness. "I think it would make a husband feel better if the man his wife had slept with before she came to his bed was wiped off the face of the earth."
"I get it now. You have the same problem. You're interested in Maude and she's slept with another man. Now you're thinking about killing him."
"Maude's married. That makes a difference. "You can't just go and kill a man who sleeps with his own wife." Yet the thought of killing a man for a woman, even if she was a married woman, didn't seem all that wrong to Ben while lying in the dangerous darkness of the desert of Mexico.
"Unless you do a good job on my face, no woman's about to marry me," Ben said.
Ben was silent for half a minute, considering whether or not to ask a second question. Then he spoke. "Evan, I've got a serious question to ask you and would like a straight answer. Now that you've killed Redpath, how do you feel about it?"
"I'm glad that I shot him. Now I've got a question for you. Don't the men of Canutillo have more than one wife?"
"Some of them do."
"Most of them, according to what I've heard."
"Maybe most do."
"Well, I've got news for you. While you were stealing horses, did you know that a federal law was passed that makes it illegal for a man to have more than one wife?"
"No, I didn't know that."
"That's a fact. And if Maude's not the man's first wife, then she's not legally married. She can leave him and there's nothing he can do about it."
"Except beat her," Ben said.
"Well, a fellow who cared about her could prevent that. He might even get the chance to shoot him."
Ben realized that it wouldn't bother him to any great degree to kill the wife-beater Lester Ivorsen.
"If that certain fellow needed a witness to help him claim self-defense, I know where he could get one cheap," Evan added.
Ben was surprised by Evan's words, words that meant he would help Ben cover up the killing that had just been in his thoughts. Ben had been sorely disappointed in Evan in Samalayuca when he had failed to help in the gunfight. Now, as he evaluated Evan's promise to help cover up a killing, as Ben had helped with Redpath, and his total commitment to ride into Mexico to get his woman, Ben's opinion of him grew greatly. He was confident that Evan wouldn't fail him in the next battle that was surely coming.
Ben made a decision that if Maude wanted to leave Ivorsen, he would help her even to the point of shooting the man if he tried to stop her. He had killed men for much less than a woman. In the Army, he had killed men for no reason other than that they wore a different-colored uniform. No, it wouldn't bother him at all to shoot Ivorsen.
"We have to get the women back before any of this means a damn," Ben said.
"You're right. I've got to sleep now."
"Same here." Ben was glad Evan was taking more of the lead in deciding what should be done and when in the search for the women. Ben might be killed in the battle with the Valdes brothers and Evan would have to protect and guide the women north of the Rio Grande.
He closed his eyes, begrudging the time he must wait to once again see Maude. As he went to sleep, he recalled the touch of her fingers upon his scars and her words that the Ben Hawkins she had known was under them.
* * *
The wild grass scissoring in the wind awoke Ben. He rose up on an elbow and looked around. He hadn't slept long, for he could still smell the lava rock of Gallegos Dos cooling in the night.
The great bulk of the hill obscured the eastern half of the heavens. To the west, the stars were falling down the long, black side of the sky. Brutus had finished grazing and was close by, sleeping standing. The animal's ears were turning just enough to hear danger before it happened. Ben was glad for the faithful horse. With his keen hearing and sense of smell, he made an excellent sentry.
Weariness was pulling on Ben's eyelids and he wanted more sleep. However, Maude and Rachel couldn't wait for that. He roused Evan and they rode into the darkness with the air still heavy with memories of the day's heat.