CHAPTER 28
The much-anticipated dinner with Wainwright turned out to be of little consequence, in and of itself. The lovely Lusita was also present, as well as her father. The food was excellent. The conversation . . . cautious.
It was clear throughout that Wainwright and Don Pedro, exhilarated by the recent developments that seemed on the brink of propelling their plans into motion, wanted to get the meal over with as soon as possible in order to return to their plotting. Discourse was polite but rather terse. Whether she understood the reasons behind it or not, Lusita appeared to sense the hurried approach as much as Buckhorn and therefore kept her own participation in any discussion to an absolute minimum.
As far as the purpose behind Buckhorn’s invitation, it had come down to a job offer for him and his gun. Wainwright claimed to have been impressed by the reports he’d gotten of Buckhorn’s skill, totally glossing over the fact that skill had been largely demonstrated on Flying W men.
When it came to his purpose for putting together the small army of gunmen he was asking Buckhorn to join, Wainwright merely explained that big changes were coming to Whitestone County and, to ensure his vast holdings were not threatened, he was making sure they were well protected. He didn’t bother going into any further details on what the “big changes” might be, and Buckhorn didn’t press it.
He did, however, accept the job offer, with the agreement that he would report for duty by noon of the following day.
When Buckhorn rode away from the Flying W after dinner was over and the terms of the job offer were settled, there was no sign of Sweetwater or anyone else to see him off. That was good. Because he had no intention of returning directly to town. Not quite yet.
He rode as far as the rock outcropping where he’d encountered Sweetwater earlier. There, he stopped and dismounted, ground-reined Sarge in a patch of good graze, and sat down with his back against the face of the rock. It still held some of the warmth of the day’s sun that had sunk deep into it. Buckhorn waited and watched and churned things over in his mind.
The first thing he’d determined was that a patrol was in place to guard the perimeter of the ranch headquarters at night. Two mounted men, one riding clockwise, the other counterclockwise, made wide, slow circles around the fenced-in area.
It wasn’t really a very effective setup. Stretches of approach to the buildings were left out of the sight of either rider for long periods. Plus the numerous longhorns milling outside the fencing made ideal cover for intruders to move in close. And the only irregularity to the timing of the riders’ rounds was when they might stop and briefly converse once in a while as they passed one another.
Buckhorn could have moved dozens of men in past the so-called patrol, he told himself, and hit the heart of the headquarters without the riders knowing anybody was within fifty miles.
But he didn’t want to move in dozens of men. Only one.
When the hour grew late enough for lights to begin blinking out in the various ranch buildings, Buckhorn got up and started walking. A whispered command to Sarge was sufficient to plant him where he was for hours.
The last of the lights to go out in the main house had been the lantern in Wainwright’s den. By then, Buckhorn was crouched in the flower garden only a few yards from the window. Employing the patience instilled by his Indian blood, he waited another half hour without moving.
Then, using the blade of his bowie knife, he silently pried open the shutter and slid the window up to gain entry into the den. He smiled grimly at the ease with which he was able to do it. Wainwright’s foolish arrogance allowed him to believe the sloppy patrol on his perimeter made everything inside it safe. The need for added caution was negligible.
Aided by a carefully shrouded lantern turned very low, Buckhorn spent another half hour poring over the papers and maps spread across the broad surface of Wainwright’s desk. The same desk he’d heard Don Pedro thumping a finger on when he was eavesdropping.
By means of a commandeered pencil and sheet of blank paper, Buckhorn made notes and crude sketches from what he perused. With this paper folded and slipped inside his shirt, he quit the den, using great care to refasten the window and leave everything inside exactly as he’d found it.
Returning in the wee hours to the dark, empty, silent streets of Wagon Wheel, Buckhorn quickly but quietly rousted first Goodwin and then Carl Orndecker, telling them he had urgent new information to share. Wanting to also include Justine, Carl led them a back way to her house and got her to let them in.
In the kitchen of Justine’s house, the four were once again gathered covertly. The blinds were drawn tight. The illumination from a single candle placed in the middle of the table cast the circle of faces in stark patterns of shadow and light.
The three listened to Buckhorn tell what he’d run across at the Flying W while they scanned his corresponding sketches and notes from the sheet of paper spread on Justine’s kitchen table. The dully ticking wall clock hanging above a shelf of display china read three o’clock.
“Such a fantastic scheme!” exclaimed Justine York. “That’s the only way to describe it.”
“And that’s exactly why they’ve been able to get so far along with it. You had all the pieces spotted. You were even talking about ’em over lunch,” Buckhorn reminded her. “All the land Wainwright has taken control of, the small army he’s put together, his chumminess with Don Pedro, and the marriage to Lusita to cement them even closer. You even mentioned the silver in the Barrancas Mountains and the Yaquis standing in the way of it. The reason you could never put it all together into the notion of Wainwright and Don Pedro figuring on starting their own country is because it’s too damn fantastic to conjure.”
“It’s more than just fantastic,” Carl said. “It’s . . . insane. Impossible . . .”
“We can go ahead and throw the whole alphabet at it if we want,” Buckhorn said. “but it’s gonna take a lot more than just words to stop those two.”
“So what do we do? Notify the sheriff? Call in the army?” Martin Goodwin wanted to know.
His inquiry hung in the air with the weight of a fifth presence.
It was Buckhorn who responded. “For us to go to the authorities seems pretty pointless to me. Sheriff Banning may not be completely under Wainwright’s thumb, but he’s close to it. No matter, something like this would be too big for him to handle on his own. He might first turn it over to the U.S. Marshals but, even at that, it would end up in the lap of the Army. You oughta be able to reckon it from there. Who are they most likely to listen to? Me, with these wild accusations laid out on this paper here—or the word of a former Yankee general, now one of the wealthiest land and cattle barons in the territory?”
“They’d hand out the loudest horselaugh ever heard in these parts,” Carl said bitterly. “And if Wainwright wanted to push it, they could probably find grounds for bringing charges against the lot of us.”
“So what does that leave?” Goodwin asked. “We can’t hold off and do nothing, just let them try and get away with it. Can we?”
Buckhorn thought of his original task. “I could ride back out there tomorrow and kill Wainwright. That’s what I was sent here to do anyway, in a roundabout way,” Buckhorn said. “Hell, if Don Pedro is still right there handy, I could go ahead and plant a couple slugs in him, too, while I was at it. That’d cut the heads off the two fattest snakes we know about.”
He shook his head. “But what would it leave? Who else might be in on their scheme? Seems doubtful it all rests strictly on the two of them. For one thing, Don Pedro mentioned spies keeping him advised on the revolution getting ready to bust loose. If there’s other snakes big enough in size—government officials, say, from either side of the border—all I’d do was give ’em warning so they could shift some things around and maybe still go ahead with a revised plan. And I’d ’ve made a target out of myself and maybe the rest of you for nothing.”
“One way or another, we’re in this with you,” Carl said. “There’s no backing out of it now.”
Justine regarded Buckhorn intently. “If you believed it would end it all, could you really do that? Ride out and simply shoot Wainwright and Don Pedro?”
Buckhorn met her eyes with a hard, flat gaze. “That’s how I used to do things. I said that so you’d know—all of you.” He cut his gaze to Goodwin and Carl before coming back to Justine. “If I was the same as then, Wainwright would already be dead and I’d be long gone. If any of that makes a difference, say so now before we go any farther.”
“I don’t have the same background as Buckhorn,” Goodwin said, “yet our mutual connection gives us the same outlook where Wainwright is concerned. I may not have the guts to do it myself, but knowing he was dead—by whatever method—would not trouble me in the least. He’s long overdue. Now it’s bigger than just killing him. We must also kill this crazy idea that, if carried out, will surely result in bloodshed and chaos on a scale nobody wants to imagine.”
“Of course we must,” Justine said, never taking her eyes off Buckhorn. “I never meant to suggest otherwise.”
“Which brings us,” Carl said, “right back to the little matter of how.”