In minutes Brit and his men reached the roaring fire, dismounted and began to fight the blaze. But they had little ammunition to use against the rapidly spreading inferno. All the water tanks on and surrounding the Tierra Verde were nearly dry, most without an ounce of water.
Side by side, Brit and Buck beat at the raging flames with dampened saddle blankets, but knew they were making little or no progress. Fueled by the strawlike dead grass and whipped by the strong west winds, the fire was already becoming a fearsome, encompassing monster.
The wind was so high the blaze had jumped the fireguards as if they were not there. There was nothing to break the sweep of the roaring, raging flames. The awesome fire was quickly exploding into a holocaust that could burn thousands of acres, as well as any man, animal or structure that stood in its way.
With heat scorching their faces and thick clouds of smoke choking them, the cowhands beat at the flames with sacks, saddle blankets, brooms and chaps. It was simply an exercise in futility as they waited for the horses and cattle to be brought down.
Jake and his wranglers soon arrived with thirty or forty nervous, snorting saddle horses. Minutes later Slim showed up, herding thirty head of prime cattle and a couple of big Spanish bulls.
Brit looked around.
He now had enough men, horses and cattle.
He threw down his blanket and drew his pistol. He was glad that Slim had thought to bring a couple of bulls. They were much bigger than the cattle, and the heavier the carcass, the better the job.
Brit took aim and fired.
The first shot rang out above the roaring den and one of the huge Spanish bulls sagged to its knees, dead. Brit fired a second shot. The other bull keeled over.
Brit holstered his still-smoking revolver, hurried to the first fallen bull, even as Buck went to the other. Knives drawn, they swiftly split the dead bulls open down the middle so there’d be plenty of fresh blood, then turned them flesh side down. Both men swiftly mounted dancing saddle ponies that Jake had brought forward. Then they waited impatiently in the saddle as the men tied the dead bulls together side by side in order to cover a wider space.
With one rope tied to Brit’s saddle horn, another to Buck’s, the pair dug their heels in the horses’ bellies and dragged the bulls down the fire line. Behind them shots rang out as the rest of the cattle were being slaughtered. Other mounted cowboys dragging bleeding carcasses would follow Brit and Buck on the line.
Dragging the heavy cattle was harder work for the horses than for the men. Because of the rapid speed of the fire, the horses had to lope while they dragged their heavy cargo. The thick smoke exhausted them quickly, so the cowhands had to change horses every half mile or so.
All the men knew that if they rode a horse too long over the burning grass, its hooves would be ruined. A horse with burned hooves took a year to heal. So Jake kept fresh horses saddled and ready to put into the line.
Working together like a well-oiled machine, the cowboys and vaqueros spaced themselves out to fight the little tongues of flame still ablaze after a drag had gone by. They had to run to keep up, so a new man was dropped every hundred yards for just that purpose.
He’d leave his horse where he started for the man fighting the fire to pick up and bring back to the main fire, there to drop out again when his turn came.
With amazing precision, the well-trained Regent cowboys soon had the drag line running smoothly. Every man was riding a horse and taking time about, dragging the cows, dropping out again to fight the remaining spots of fire when his time came.
While Brit and his bunch fought the lead fire, Juarez and Juan Valdez were busy setting back fires at the northern edge of the pasture in a valiant attempt to protect the mansion.
Up at the house, Anna heard the gunshots, jumped and turned questioning eyes on LaDextra.
“Brit’s doing what has to be done, Anna.” And the Regent matriarch explained the necessity of slaughtering the cattle.
The two women watched in growing horror as the inferno continued to blaze despite the unflagging efforts of the cowboys on the drag line. Wind driven, the flames were moving ever closer to the house.
“Oh, Robert, Robert!” LaDextra addressed her long-dead husband, wringing her hands. “Looks like the fire’s going to get this beautiful home you built for me.”
“That’s not going to happen,” Anna soothed, but she, too, was afraid the spreading fire would engulf the stately mansion. She had to keep her wits about her in case they needed to flee quickly.
Down at the lead fire, Brit felt a growing sense of frustration and despair. Night had fallen, but the wind continued to blow. His eyes watering, throat raw, he watched helplessly as the strong west wind whipped around and checked its speed, almost stopping at times, like a whirlwind, only to blaze up again, higher and hotter.
Brit’s main concern was for the house. He knew how much that big old white mansion meant to LaDextra. They had to save it for her.
By ten o’clock that night the firefighters were out of cattle carcasses and out of fresh horses. Exhausted, hot and thirsty, the men again took up their dampened feed sacks and saddle blankets. Beating wildly at the flames, Brit and Buck advanced aggressively forward, followed by a half-dozen cowboys.
It was Brit who first realized that they had maneuvered themselves into a dangerous position. Behind them the blaze had caught again. And spread. Ahead there was a wide wall of flames, shooting a hundred feet into the night sky. In every direction was fire. Hot, breath-stealing fire. Racing, deadly fire.
“God almighty,” said Jake, back at the north edge of the fire with his tired remuda, “Brit and his boys are cut off.”
“Looks that way,” said Slim, shaking his head.
“Madre de Dios,” murmured old Cheno, and crossed himself.
“Look, LaDextra.” Anna pointed to the line of fire, which had not moved northward in the past half hour. “The back blaze the men set has stopped the forward march of the main fire. I’m sure the house is safe. You’re not going to lose your beloved mansion.”
“Oh, thank God,” said LaDextra, sagging down onto a chair.
But she was up again in a minute when a young horseman, galloping at full speed in the darkness, approached the house. Out of breath, shaking with excitement and emotion, he hurried toward the gallery and the two worried women waiting there.
“Patrono, señorita,” he said, “it’s—it’s…”
“What? What is it, Ricardo? Calm down and tell us,” ordered LaDextra.
“Is the patrón,” said the young, frightened vaquero. “He and Buck Shanahan and a half-dozen men…Dios…they have been cut off. They’re surrounded by fire!”
Anna automatically took a couple of steps forward, before she caught herself. Her heart pounding fiercely, she had the overwhelming desire to hurry down the steps and rush out to the fire. To Brit. To her darling Brit. To run headlong through the smoke and flames until she found him and knew he was safe.
She checked herself, knew that she had to stay right where she was and watch after LaDextra.
Brit felt the intense heat on his face as the shooting flames raced steadily closer. Anxiously he looked around. He saw no way out. They were trapped. There was nothing to stop the blaze. They were going to perish.
He remembered the telegram in his shirt pocket. If he died in the fire, the telegram might survive. He couldn’t let that happen. If he was gone there was no reason to break LaDextra’s heart. She believed that she had found her long-lost granddaughter. He would let her go on believing it.
Brit stopped beating at the flames long enough to reach inside his shirt pocket. He took out the yellow telegram, tossed it into the flames and watched it quickly catch and burn.
And the fire steadily advanced.
Midnight.
Word came that the fire had finally been brought under control. The house was no longer in any danger. There was no word as to the fate of the men.
LaDextra refused to go to bed until there was news of Brit, Buck and the others. Anna understood and stayed up with her, anxiously looking southward, waiting, hoping, praying.
Anna remained totally mute while LaDextra went on and on about how she couldn’t bear it if anything happened to her boy, to her precious Brit. She talked nonstop about him, laughing about things he had done as a child, bragging about things he had done as a man.
When finally she paused for breath, she looked up and studied Anna’s pale, drawn face. She had never seen such naked misery in a pair of eyes. How foolish, how selfish she had been not to see, not to know.
LaDextra reached for Anna’s hand and said softly, “Oh, Anna, forgive me, I didn’t realize. You love him, too, don’t you? You’re in love with Brit.”
Anna bowed her head, but did not deny it. She squeezed the older woman’s hand and fought back the tears that were threatening to fall.
The women stayed there on the shadowy gallery as another long, nerve-racking hour dragged slowly by.
The clock inside the mansion was striking one o’clock when, at long last, Brit appeared. Dirty. Sweaty. Exhausted. His face was blackened and scorched by the flames.
But he was unhurt.
To both women, he had never looked better.
“Brit, Brit,” cried LaDextra as he came up the front walk, “you made it, you escaped! Thank God. Thank God!”
“We all made it.” Brit called out. “There was a brief lull in the wind and the boys were able to beat out a narrow corridor through the flames and pull us to safety.”
When he came up onto the gallery, LaDextra threw her brittle arms around his neck and began to cry happy tears of relief.
Over her head Brit glanced at Anna. He could see the sweetness of her lips as they turned up into a smile and the way her expressive eyes clung adoringly to him. And he knew, all over again, that what he had been trying hard to deny within himself could never be denied.
Brit smiled warmly at Anna, reached for her hand and held it firmly in his own. He gazed at her with a look in his eyes that he knew mirrored the telling expression in hers. No words were needed. The message that passed between them was unmistakable.
Brit gave Anna’s soft hand one last squeeze and released it.
“Now, now, darlin’.” Brit turned his full attention to the weeping LaDextra, soothing her. He lifted her up in his powerful arms and carried her inside. Anna followed, but stopped in the entryway, turned and went into the lamplit parlor.
To wait.
Brit carried LaDextra straight down the hall to her room, all the while assuring her, in a low, gentle voice, that he was fine and so were the rest of the boys. At her door, he stepped inside and nodded to her waiting maid, Connie. Brit gently laid the tired woman on her bed and turned her over to Connie.
“Rest easy, dear,” he said to LaDextra. “Everything’s fine. Just fine.”