JOE BREWSTER KNEW that something was wrong in this apparent paradise. Very wrong. He had found refuge in the beautiful valley in an attempt to escape the relentless bounty hunter who, he knew, would die rather than give up his intention to add him to his tally of dead wanted outlaws. Yet the place Brewster had thought would be a peaceful and safe place to hide was anything but. Just like the vaqueros and farmers, he too had heard the gunfire the previous day and wondered who had squeezed those triggers. Unlike the others though, the outlaw had no desire to go and find out. He knew that it might have been another of the tricks the bounty hunter employed to lure the naive into his web of death.
The creek which ran along the length of the valley would have been an easy way to travel from its northern end to the distant south but Brewster knew that that would have given Iron Eyes an easy target. Joe Brewster had already seen what the infamous hunter of men had done to his brothers and did not want to join them in the bowels of Hell too soon.
The outlaw had seen Iron Eyes fall wounded when he had fired a volley of deadly lead at him back at Rio Valdo. Anyone else would have quit his pursuit, but not the hideous bounty hunter. He had somehow managed to keep on coming after him.
Brewster remembered his utter shock when he had glanced behind him and seen the rider still following him.
The outlaw knew that if he were to have any chance of escaping the certain death of finding himself in Iron Eyes’ gun sights he had to stay in the woods and eventually try to navigate a way down into the Mexican heartland.
A thousand trees and the dense undergrowth would have to be his shield, his only protection from Iron Eyes’ lethal accuracy. Yet Brewster had already learned that this was no easy place through which to ride. After hiding in the dense woodland for nearly a whole day he had finally decided to try his luck and start out on his bid for freedom.
He had to escape. Time was running out and every nerve and sinew of his body told him so.
But this place was far more dangerous than he had imagined when his eyes first saw the unexpected valley from the high desert ridge.
All day he had seen and heard riders as they travelled through the fast-moving waters of the wide creek. Something was definitely wrong and he did not want to get involved in anything which might hamper his attempt to escape Iron Eyes’ vengefulness. Brewster had not recognized any of the horsemen but knew what hired gunmen looked like, whatever their nationality. The vaqueros were heavily armed and obviously looking for someone or something to kill.
He knew that it could not be his hide they sought as only one man knew that he had entered the valley, but that did not make him sit any easier on his rested mount. They were gunning for someone and after escaping Iron Eyes he prayed that he would not get caught in the middle of other men’s lethal crossfire. The ruthless Brewster knew how to kill but he was no fighter. His breed were back-shooters. Nothing more and nothing less.
So far his luck had saved him. Yet luck can be bad as well as good, he told himself.
Brewster steadied the horse beneath him and patted the saddle-bags. They were swollen with the money he and his dead brothers had stolen down in San Remus. Now it was all his and he wanted to spend every damn penny of it.
He tapped his spurs and moved away from the small clearing where he had spent so many hours chewing on jerky and hardtack and began his journey once more.
As the horse began the difficult walk between the trees his mind raced. A thought came to the outlaw. One which made him smile.
Maybe those Mexican gunfighters were after Iron Eyes. It was a thought which gave him the courage to continue onward.
Pepe Gomez was no tracker but even he could not fail to see the unmistakable hoof tracks left by the palomino stallion ridden by the unknown man who had bettered Pedro Ruiz. The tracks had led away from where they had discovered Ruiz’s body, across the muddy bank of the creek and into the wood. The vaquero had led his six companions across the almost trackless ground. Only one animal had travelled this route in days and that was the palomino.
The sun filtered through the tree canopies and was on their backs but none of them seemed to notice. Each of them knew that somewhere ahead death awaited them. They continued trailing the elusive horseman with only one thought between them.
They knew that they would not only have to find their prey but they would have to kill him as well. Don Miguel Sanchez would expect nothing less than a trophy to calm his anger. A head to place on a pike upon the high walls of his hacienda. A carcass to skin and nail to the drawbridge as a warning to all others who dared to enter the forbidden Eden.
When the seven horsemen had set out just after dawn it had seemed an easy task to achieve. Seven men to kill just one. The longer they had ridden the more their mutual doubts had grown.
They had begun to realize that this was no ordinary man they were hunting.
Who was it who could get the better of Ruiz with a single shot? Whoever it was, the man was brave. No coward had fired that lethal shot.
The bushes and trees were getting harder and harder for the seven horsemen to negotiate. Everything green seemed to be entangled in thorn-covered brambles. Barbed wire created by nature itself. Progress had become slow and painful. The further they travelled the more difficult it was for their sturdy mounts to find ways through the unyielding undergrowth. These were prized horses and none of the vaqueros wanted them to be scarred or ripped apart by the savagely thorny vegetation.
Iron Eyes, on the other hand, had spurred and driven onwards the powerful stallion beneath him without a second thought for the animal’s welfare.
Every drop of sweat reminded Gomez that they had to continue their search for, even though they were all weary of the chase, their fear of returning to Sanchez without the killer was even more terrifying. Gomez knew that it would be their heads on pikes should they fail in their mission. Nothing less would appease Sanchez.
Gomez rode at the head of the seven riders. As they emerged from the woods it was he who kept his eyes upon the soft fertile soil. He who followed the tracks left by the stallion’s hoofs.
The seven vaqueros rode up a small rise and then saw the one thing that they had spent days searching for. All the horsemen reined in and stared in disbelief across the tops of the trees at the black smoke which could still be seen twisting up into the blue sky miles ahead of them.
Gomez lifted a hand and pointed.
‘Look. Smoke,’ he declared.
The other vaqueros remained silent as they too stared at the smoke. Each man wondered who it was who had suddenly allowed smoke to rise into the heavens.
Was it the last of the settlers?
Or was it the unknown gunman whose trail they had followed for so long?
Gomez turned and looked at another of the men called Antonio Picario. Picario was almost thirty and, unlike his fellow vaqueros, wore two guns. He could use them both with equal accuracy.
‘What do you think, Antonio?’ Gomez asked.
‘I think it is smoke,’ came the insolent reply.
‘But who has made this smoke?’
‘Whoever it is I think we should kill him.’
Gomez nodded in agreement.
Suddenly, to their total surprise, a hundred yards ahead of them the vaqueros saw a fleeting glimpse of someone moving behind a line of trees.
‘There he is,’ one of the horsemen announced, dragging his pistol from its holster.
Gomez held on to his reins tightly.
He had seen the figure but it was a long way from where the smoke was rising.
‘It does not make any sense, amigos. How could the smoke be over there and the rider down in the trees?’
There was no time for reply.
Suddenly a Winchester opened up from between two of the trees. The sound of the shots came a split second after bullets tore into them. Horses reared up as two riders were blasted from their saddles. More shots followed. The horses whinnied in alarm. Gomez spun his mount as another volley of bullets cut into them again.
His eyes were wide open and unblinking. A pain unlike anything he had ever felt before cut into him.
Gomez hit the ground hard.
Seeing Gomez on the ground, Picario drew both his guns and cocked their hammers. Gomez managed to force himself up on one elbow.
‘Take cover, Antonio,’ Gomez coughed.
But mere words of caution were not what hot-blooded men like Picario wanted to hear. His was a far simpler solution. In his view only cowards would take cover.
‘Come on, my brothers. Let us make this dog pay,’ the vaquero screamed at the others. He started to fire back at the man who still cocked and fired his rifle at them. The vaqueros spurred and drove on down the hill. Their murderous chants filled the woods.
Steering the animal with the power of his legs alone Picario cocked and fired each gun in turn as his three fellow riders spread out.
A haze of gun smoke spread across the clearing, filling the gunmen’s nostrils with its acrid stench. No longer could they see the target of the vengeance they wished to dish out.
All four riders were within twenty yards of the rifleman when Picario too felt the powerful impact of the bullets which cut through him. The young vaquero was lifted off his saddle like a rag doll. He rolled over the cantle of his saddle and fell. He seemed to float in the air for an eternity as his mount raced on without him. When he hit the lush grass it was obvious he was dead.
The others continued shooting and charging down to where the plumes of rifle smoke still hung on the warm air.
The three horsemen hauled rein and blasted their guns at the gap between the two trees.
There was no reply.
No return of fire.
The rifleman was no longer there.
As their hammers fell on spent casings and their gun smoke slowly cleared the vaqueros realized that their attacker had gone.
Joe Brewster was already a hundred yards away.
He was spurring his mount away from the clearing and what was left of the vaqueros.
Unknown to the vicious outlaw, his route would take him directly to a more deadly place.
And a far more deadly enemy.