THE TELLER BLINKED behind his wire-rimmed spectacles. “You wish this bill changed into ten-dollar bills, señor?”
“Correct,” Duke Benedict smiled around a freshly-lit cigar. “That will come to one hundred ten-dollar bills,” he added helpfully.
“You do not wish to open the account?”
“As impressive in appearance and as sound in reputation as your fine establishment is—no, I don’t wish to open an account.”
“One moment, señor,” the man said and left his cage, carrying the one thousand-dollar bill gingerly to the manager’s office. Even in bustling Starrado City, big bills like this were rare. And when presented by strange gringos, they were plainly something to be approved by the man who, in the eyes of the clerks, stood only slightly below God ... the manager.
Manager and teller reappeared moments later. The portly manager held the note in his fingers. He saw the handsome Americano leaning lazily on the counter in his broadcloth suit, frilled shirtfront and immaculate, low-crowned Stetson. He was winking at sixty-years-old Señorita Gonzales, the bank’s oldest employee. The manager was appalled to see the woman blush and giggle like a giddy girl.
In the name of the Virgin of Guadeloupe, was there no modesty left in this sinful world?
The manager cleared his throat. “Change the money as he wishes!” he told the teller. “Pronto!”
“We do not question him as to how he came by it, sir?”
“Not unless we wish to waste the entire day,” the manager said austerely and with a withering glare at his ageing lady clerk, he stamped back into his office and slammed the door.
Basking in the glow of the effect he was having on the interested clerks of the bank, Benedict paused at the door to tuck his money safely in an inside pocket. Then he tipped his hat to Señorita Gonzales and sallied out into the brilliant sunshine where Brazos waited with the horses.
Benedict noticed immediately that Hank Brazos was wearing a pained expression, which in fact indicated that the giant young Texan was doing some deep thinking. Evading Brazos’ battle-scarred trail hound Bullpup, who took a nip at his well-polished heels as a matter of course, Benedict took the reins of his black and swung up gracefully.
“Something on your mind, Johnny Reb?”
“Mebbe,” Brazos grunted as he too mounted up. “You still calculate them San Carlos fellers might be after us?”
“I certainly wouldn’t be putting all these fast miles behind us otherwise.”
“You know, I been thinkin’ about what we done back there
“And?”
Brazos scratched the back of his thick blond thatch, tilting his battered relic of a Stetson forward.
“Well, I was kinda wonderin’ if we done right, Benedict. I know that them jaspers was crooks and they was takin’ folks left and right. But we took to the tall and uncut with a thousand bucks of their money and it seems to me that’s got kind of a dishonest smell to it. Wouldn’t you say?”
Benedict just smiled. There were times when Hank Brazos’ rigid attitude towards right and wrong could really irk him. But not today. Today he felt ten feet tall and brimful of tolerance—even for an overgrown Texan with an over-active conscience. Just two days ago, they had been sitting in a cantina in San Carlos, facing up to the hard fact that the cattle dealer who’d hired them to drive a hundred head of beef all the way down from Arizona had vanished with the sale money, leaving them busted flat and far from home. A favorable run with the cards had improved their fortunes slightly but it hadn’t been until Brazos returned to their hotel with a hundred dollars of sucker money and an amazing tale of a man who could actually conjure up money, that Duke Benedict had scented an opportunity to put the smile back on the fickle face of Lady Luck. Duke had planned the counter attack cleverly; they had pulled it off in style ... and his conscience was as clear as spring water.
He flicked cigar ash deliberately down onto Bullpup, then set the Cuban between his teeth as they clattered across the bridge leading out of town. “I took the trouble to make some enquiries about our good friend Kell Zachary while waiting for you to set him up last evening, Reb,” he informed Brazos. “There was little to be gleaned in the way of solid facts, but there was no shortage of rumors. Friend Zachary is reputed not only to be a confidence trickster, market manipulator and thief, but a bandit and killer to boot.”
“You ain’t just sayin’ that to make me feel better about takin’ him for that thousand?”
“Indeed not.”
“Yeah, well, he did strike me as a rooster who could turn real mean.”
“So I’m informed. I was also told that friend Zachary has certain connections in high places down here, which if true, makes it all the more important that we shake him off.”
“High places? You mean the law?”
“Federale connections to be exact,” Benedict supplied, then waited for the reaction.
It came quickly in the sudden hard set of Brazos’ bronzed jaw and the flinty glitter in his eye. There were few classes of people easy-going Brazos detested, but high on that list stood the Federales, the Mexican mounted police. Being a Texan, Hank Brazos had been reared on stories of Federale corruption and cruelty, stories that had been confirmed by his own experiences south of the border.
“Hell, then,” he declared emphatically, “if that’s the way the wind blows with Zachary, then I guess he had it comin’.”
“Indeed,” Benedict agreed taking the money from his inside pocket. He split the wad of bills expertly with his thumb, then passed one half across to Brazos. “And you have this coming, Johnny Reb. You may have demonstrated all the bovine gullibility of a prime steer in a slaughterhouse when you blundered into Zachary’s web, but you more than compensated by the way you handled your end when we went after him. Well done, Texas.”
Praise from Duke Benedict was so rare that Hank Brazos beamed as he thrust the money into his hip pocket.
He chuckled, recalling the furious two-man stampede staged by big Kell Zachary and villainous-looking California Jim when the tangle between the ‘lawman’ and his ‘prisoner’ made them head for open country.
“Well, like you always say ... ‘All’s well that ends well,’ Yank.”
Benedict glanced back over his shoulder, looking sober now. They were passing along a wooded valley on the trail that wound beside the river. On the river’s edge, the morning breeze set the leaves on the trees dancing. It was pretty country for Sonora. It was also much too civilized and closely settled for men on the run.
“I think that with gentlemen like Zachary and company after us, we won’t be safe until we have Arizona soil under our feet, Reb,” he opined. “And to make quite sure we get there safely, I suggest you occupy yourself with what you do best.”
“Got you,” Brazos grinned, and immediately swung from the well-used trail and struck northwest through the timber.
What country-born Hank Brazos did best of all was break new trails. Though a modest man by nature, Brazos took second place to no man in his ability to find, conceal or blaze a trail, regardless of the country. His hard-luck old daddy had once boasted that his boy Henry could ‘track a bluebird across an empty sky,’ and Duke Benedict reckoned this was no exaggeration. To city-bred Benedict, Brazos was an awesome backwoodsman, and he was more than happy to sit back now and let his saddle pard take over.
Brazos led the way directly for the foothills of the mighty Sierra Madres. Within the hour the verdant river valley was far behind and they were travelling over flinty upland country stippled with Spanish bayonet and mescal brush. From up here they could see the distant trace of the Magdalena Valley which they’d followed down from Arizona to San Carlos on the cattle drive. They had been pushing north ever since quitting San Carlos during the night, but Brazos now kept them on a more northwesterly tack that ultimately led to the ironstone country he’d glimpsed from the river trail.
Once their horses were clattering over the ironstone slopes, Brazos no longer concerned himself with picking a way through country that would leave little sign. On the ironstone they left no tracks at all.
Mid-afternoon found them deep in the rugged hills with the only identifiable landmarks the snow-tipped peaks of the Sierra Madres rearing into the azure sky. It was blistering hot and men and horses were sweating, but Duke Benedict reckoned it was worthwhile when Hank Brazos finally checked his horse on a high ridge and said quietly, “That’ll do it, Yank.” If Brazos said their trail was safe, then that meant a score of Mexican bloodhounds couldn’t pick it up.
Brazos turned to the way ahead. “Easy ridin’ and pretty weather all the way to the good old U.S. now, Yank,” he predicted.
It certainly seemed that way and Duke Benedict lit a leisurely cigar and fell in behind again as Brazos led the way up.
Sitting easier in the saddle now, Brazos lifted the harmonica that hung from a rawhide thong around his muscular neck and blew a tune through it as they approached the jaws of a brush-choked arroyo. Padding along in the shadow of his master’s appaloosa, Bullpup pricked his ears to the familiar strains of ‘Texas Jack Slaughter’ his tongue lolling as if he enjoyed it.
It was very quiet in the Paloverde Hills. But not for long.
Now, ever since the old home mule had stuck its big, long eared head through the window and licked the soles of his baby feet, Hank Brazos had been used to surprises. But he wasn’t prepared for the double-barreled surprise he got when, turning into the arroyo, he had a .50 bullet blasted over his head and found their path blocked by a freckle-faced kid with a smoking gun almost as big as himself looking grimly determined to see if he couldn’t do better with his next shot.
“Jumped up Judas from Joliet!” Brazos yelled as the booming echoes of the shot rolled away through the hills. “We come in peace, kid! Hey, Benedict, what are you doin’ with that Colt?”
“About to use it,” threatened a grim-faced Duke Benedict, who hated being shot at, regardless of the age and size of the shooter. “Unless Davy Crockett here unburdens himself of that rifle fast.”
Brazos swung back to face the boy who seemed to be having some difficulty in jacking another shell into the Henry .50 whose recoil had all but dumped him on his backside when he cut loose.
“Kid!” Brazos shouted, then with an impatient sound in his throat, he spurred forward. The boy with the rifle certainly looked spunky enough, but the spectacle of a two hundred and twenty pound horseman atop a barrel-chested appaloosa backed up by a snarling trail hound boring down on him, proved unnerving. As he swung towards the campsite a powerful arm swung down around his belly and he found himself swung high and kicking into the air with the big Henry tumbling harmlessly into the dust.
Hank Brazos had a way with kids, yet young Hughie Moore seemed impervious to it during the following five minutes as the Texan tried to discover who he was and what the hell he was up to. Then a strange thing happened. Showing an uncharacteristic side of the Benedict style, Duke stepped between them and drawled, “You’re going about it the wrong way, Reb. Can’t you see the kid’s scared out of his wits? Give him time to relax and he’ll tell us all we want to know.”
Immediately the kid stopped raising hell. He seemed to like Benedict’s approach, and long before his father and uncle returned to camp Hughie had apologized for mistaking them for bandidos.
Hughie Moore, at ten years of age, was on a prospecting trip with his father Dusty, and his father’s brother, Carl Moore. His father and uncle had gone off in search of water, leaving the boy in charge of the dry camp and the horses. The Arizonans had had trouble with bandidos and Federales since entering Mexico a week earlier, and when he’d heard their horses, young Hughie had opened up.
The kid grinned across at Benedict, who was dropping coffee into the bubbling old pot by the fire. “Lucky I’m such a bad shot, Mr. Duke.”
“Double lucky that kids aren’t in season, young Hughie,” Benedict replied with a wink. “How soon do you expect your father back?”
“He’s right here!” a voice said from the surrounding screen of brush, and Brazos and Benedict leaped to their feet at the gleam of sunlight on a rifle barrel. “Reach, you varmints!”
“Pa, it’s all right,” Hughie called, jumping up. “Mr. Hank and Mr. Duke are friendlies!”
“Says who?” came the distrustful response and the brush parted to reveal a shabbily dressed red-headed man holding a Winchester. Behind him was a larger, tougher-looking replica of himself, with a gleaming rifle in his hands.
“Get them hands up, strangers!” ordered Dusty Moore, striding forward.
“Right up,” confirmed brother Carl, curling back the hammer of his .32. “We got you cold.”
“Is that a fact?” Duke Benedict drawled, and the next instant Dusty Moore stopped so sharply that his brother cannoned into him and almost knocked him off his feet.
The reason for Dusty Moore’s abrupt halt was the pair of white-handled Peacemakers that suddenly filled Benedict’s hands. Even Brazos, familiar as he was with his partner’s dazzling gun skill, was taken by surprise by the blinding speed of his draw, while the three Moores gaped in amazement.
Benedict’s smile flashed and his clipped voice showed no tension. “Who has who cold, amigo?” he asked lightly. Then he spun his left hand Colt on his forefinger in a blurring circle that was meant to impress lesser men before levelling it out again, trained on Dusty Moore’s gaping face. “In case you don’t know it, I can shoot you both dead before either of you can pull a trigger.”
“And he ain’t just whistlin’ Dixie,” Brazos said, finding his voice. “Better put up them rifles while you’re still able, boys.”
“A gunfighter!” Carl Moore accused.
“Yeah, a gunfighter!” young Hughie confirmed, but with a totally different inflexion. The kid was staring up at Benedict’s imposing figure like he was one of the Knights of the Round Table.
“Better do what he says, Carl,” Dusty said finally, letting his rifle angle downwards.
“Sons of bitches!” the bigger Carl spat, though he too let his rifle tilt downwards. “They’re bandits, Dusty—after our map, I’ll bet a million.”
Benedict murmured, “Map? Surely not a treasure map, gentlemen?” He laughed softly. “I’d forgotten how popular such things are in Old Mexico.”
“It’s a real treasure map, Mr. Duke,” Hughie insisted.
“Hush up, boy!” Dusty rapped. “These fellers don’t want to hear about our map.”
“You’ve never said a truer word,” Benedict assured him, motioning for the two men to set their rifles against a boulder. “But naturally we shall, for a true treasure hunter is no more able to keep his mouth closed than a big-mouthed bass.” He holstered his guns. “I believe the coffee is boiling.”
The brothers Moore blinked at one another in the slanting afternoon sunlight. Experience had written its lines deeply in the faces of these two tall Arizonans. They had never seen a partnership like this before. Benedict looked like a riverboat gambler, talked like an eastern dude, and handled six-guns like a professional. Brazos, on the other hand, looked big and powerful enough to lift locomotives for exercise and they sensed the steel behind his guileless blue eyes and lazy Texas drawl. These two shaped up as a very formidable duo and no mistake.
Even so, there was something engaging about the strangers, as indeed there was about the brothers, slow-talking Dusty in particular. As a result, one mug of coffee each became two, and by the time the brothers got around to inviting Brazos and Benedict to share supper with them, they had come to know one another pretty well in the quick fashion of men meeting up with fellow countrymen in a foreign land.
The Moores broke out a bottle of rye whisky as the moon climbed to bathe the countryside in a warm hospitable light.
Hank Brazos hunkered by the little fire, feeding the flames with mesquite twigs. A Bull Durham cigarette dangled casually from his lips and every now and then he would pick a piece of meat from the skillet and flip it to his dog. Bullpup never missed. On good days he just couldn’t. His teeth clicked like meshing steel gears. He paid no attention as the whisky bottle went the rounds, for Hank Brazos’ trail hound was strictly a beer-drinking dog.
The Moore brothers sat side by side on a deadfall log, talking easily about hard times in Arizona, listening intently to Benedict’s embellished account of their latest expedition into Old Mexico.
In shirtsleeves and string tie and nursing a fine Havana cigar, Benedict took but one sip of the bottle, pronounced the contents an insult to the educated palate of a Boston-bred gentleman, then went on to tell of the strange sequence of circumstances that had led to his teaming up with Brazos after first meeting on opposing sides during the Civil War.
Benedict was a master raconteur and his audience was totally absorbed by his tales, none more so than young Hughie, who sat with his skinny arms linked about his knees, staring up at the storyteller and hanging on every word. The boy didn’t even seem to blink.
Carl Moore was a man who dearly loved to pull a cork, yet tonight the more he drank the quieter he became. Carl was doing some heavy thinking. Brazos thought the man’s silence strange, his brother reckoned it was out of character, while young Hughie was vaguely aware that Uncle Carl hadn’t broken into song as yet as was his wont after the first two or three drinks.
Only Benedict seemed to accept Carl Moore’s brooding mood as perfectly natural, for he believed he understood the cause of it. The partners had already learned that the Moores had sunk every last cent into their treasure hunt and Benedict guessed that Carl was obsessed with it. Deliberately he steered the conversation around to treasure hunting in general. Soon Dusty Moore was talking freely about their plans. Brazos helped the talk along for he had a good working knowledge of mining. Finally, the Moores produced their map. Straight-faced, Benedict and Brazos inspected it.
The piece of hide which Dusty Moore produced from an inner pocket of his threadbare jacket was triangular in shape, with frayed edges. It was crinkled with age. Brazos took it in his big hands and studied it. He had seen many such maps. Some had simply been crude sets of directions, while others were accurate charts. Some had been very old, some new, and some artificially aged. This hide was old, there was no doubt in Hank’s mind about that. The Texan couldn’t read, but with this sort of map, understanding the signs and markings were far more important. He could tell by the flow of the rivers and the contour of the mountains that the Moores’ ‘treasure’ lay deep in the rugged Chuchillo Mountains in Central Sonora.
Showing no sign of reservation now, Dusty Moore revealed how he’d been given the map by a dying old Mexican to whom he’d given hospitality during his last days in Arizona. The old man had assured him that the map, if correctly followed, would lead him to the Lost Mission de Los Vallencinos, supposed hiding place of the Golden Virgin of Santo Sabinas.
Now though Brazos was the Mexico expert, Duke Benedict had spent enough time in the country to have heard the legend of the Golden Virgin. It was probably impossible for any traveler down here not to hear it, and he was cynically amused at the avid interest shown by Brazos as the Moores retold the story again ... spun the tale of a solid gold, jewel encrusted statue of the Virgin Mary worth, naturally, a king’s ransom.
Benedict had not expected the Moores to talk so freely and at such great length, and he was puzzling over this when Carl Moore finally let slip that the Chuchillos were currently being subjected to bandit attacks.
“Ah-hah!” he said aloud, and drew four curious stares in return.
“What was that, Yank?” Brazos asked.
“What you just heard was the satisfied sound that a confirmed cynic utters when his worst suspicions are confirmed, Johnny Reb.”
Hank Brazos remained none the wiser.
“Would you let me have that again in American?”
“With pleasure,” Benedict said, rising to his full height with the firelight illuminating his slender frame. “In simple terms, Texan, it means that our hosts’ hospitality and ready confidences may not be strictly unselfish. I strongly suspect they are on the verge of making us an offer.”
“What kind of offer?” Brazos asked, blinking at the two brothers.
“Why, an offer to escort them on their quest in return for a small share of the proceeds. Am I mistaken, gentlemen?”
“Of course you are,” Brazos began, but broke off when he looked at the Moores. “He is, ain’t he?”
Dusty Moore managed a rueful smile. “Well, not exactly, Hank ...” He paused, glanced sideways at his brother, then went on. “Truth to tell, the deeper we’ve been gettin’ into Mexico, the more we’ve been hearin’ about the bandit troubles down south, and the more we’ve been wonderin’ if we’d ever make it to where we want to go. I reckon me and Carl could use a brace of fellers that handle themselves the way you boys do.”
“Well, I’ll be damned!” Brazos exclaimed.
“That may well be,” Benedict replied with a hint of smugness. “But at least you won’t bring Judgment Day forward by getting conned into committing suicide by these losers, will you?”
“Losers?” Carl Moore echoed. “Hey, that’s a bit strong, ain’t it, Duke?”
“No stronger than you deserve,” Benedict retorted, but hesitated when he saw the boy staring up at him with a hurt look. He shrugged, forced a smile. “I just mean that anybody who risks his life on a scrap of parchment must lose in the end. Sorry, Hughie, but that’s a fact of life you’ll come to learn for yourself one day. And now if you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I think it’s time somebody stood watch. I’ll leave you to your dreaming, with the hope that my advice may have been some benefit.”
He walked away, leaving silence behind him. It was Dusty Moore who finally broke it.
“You reckon your pard’s right, Hank?”
“He’s got an aggravatin’ habit of often bein’ that way.”
“We’ve been choused by Federales and dodged a pack of bandidos already,” Dusty admitted. “It ain’t goin’ to get better as we go south.”
“Then mebbe you ought to change your mind?”
“Too late,” said Dusty. He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the big pile of gear stacked beside the horses and burros drowsing on the remuda line. “We’ve sold up the spread and everythin’ we owned to provision up for this here trip. If we quit now, we starve.”
“The three of us,” Carl Moore said lugubriously.
They were working on him, but trustful Hank Brazos didn’t know it.