The position was defensible and that was all that Davis wanted. A place where they could fan out, cover the approaches, and have half a chance of surviving. The rocky overhangs meant that the Apaches couldn’t get behind them or above them and shoot down on them. They’d have to come at them from the front, over open ground. With repeating rifles, Davis knew they could hold off a battalion. Until the ammo ran out.
There was no water either, but Davis figured the ammo would run out before they ran out of water. If they could survive until nightfall, they could split up, each man for himself. Some of them were sure to get away then.
“Got Bradford watching the horses,” said Bailey. “Webster’s on the right, by that big rock, watching for them from that direction.”
“Tell Bradford to forget the horses. They’ll stay here until the shooting starts and once it does, we’re going to need every gun.”
“We lose the horses and we won’t be able to get out of here.”
“I think,” said Davis quietly, “that we’re going to have to get out on foot after dark anyway.”
Before Bailey could respond, one of the men yelled, “I got riders coming at us.”
Davis ran forward, and leaned across a hot rock. There were two men riding fast and behind them was a group chasing them. It was obvious what was happening.
“Take out the second group. Fire when you have a good target. Be careful of the men in front.”
He hesitated, waiting for the troops to respond with a “Yes sir,” and then remembered that these were civilians. They would fire when they wanted, and they would keep shooting until they were out of ammo or had decided that the good targets were gone. No fire discipline.
The two riders in front suddenly veered to the rocks as if they had decided to make a stand. Davis wanted them to know that help was around, but he didn’t want to frighten them. If firing broke out suddenly, they might assume it was another bunch of Apaches. He leaped to the top of the rock, made sure that his hat was pulled down, and aimed his rifle at the second group. He fired once, twice, three times.
The lead rider turned and then glanced at him. He turned again, now riding direcdy toward the rocks. He had decided that help would be found among the rocks.
With that, Davis dropped back to the ground. He leaned over the rock, bracing his elbow and hand against it to steady his aim. He followed one of the riders, trying to lead him, and fired again with no results.
Now the rest of the men with him began to shoot. The two front riders ducked low, riding straight for the rocks. The Apaches followed for a moment and then turned away. One of them was hit and let out a scream. Another fell from his horse and then jumped to his feet, staggering away from the riflemen.
They kept shooting as fast as they could. The Apaches wheeled and fled. The one man on the ground kept moving away from them until he was hit again. He dropped and didn’t move.
The horsemen reached the rocks and as they did, they leaped from the saddle. One of them jerked his rifle from the scabbard, whirled and aimed, but then didn’t fire. The Apaches were already out of range.
The second man slipped to the ground and stood watching the fleeing Indians. He held the reins in his left hand. When they disappeared and the firing ended, he turned and looked up into the rocks.
Davis came down and held out a hand. “Name’s Davis,” he said, and then stopped. “You were in the bar.”
“Name’s Freeman. Yeah, I was in the bar.” He studied Davis for a moment and then asked, “You the bartender?”
“Was.”
“So you’re out here for the same reason. Looking for the gold that old man talked about.”
“Yeah,” said Davis. “Somebody killed that old man. Knifed him.”
“I’d heard,” said Freeman.
“Yeah,” said Davis again. “Better get your horses back out of the way. The Apaches will be back.”
“Guess we’re not going to find the gold now,” said Freeman. He shot a glance at his partner.
“Not for a while anyway,” said Davis.
They reached the top of a ridge and Travis stopped. The Apaches who had been chasing them were still out of sight. They were probably still at the wagon.
He turned and looked down into the next valley. There was a shallow river through it and mountains off to the right. There had been firing from that direction, but it had stopped. He could see nothing of interest below him.
“We head back to El Paso now?” asked Crockett.
“No,” said Travis. “We keep heading to the west for a while longer. The Apaches were to the south of us. This should take us away from them.”
“Down there,” she said.
“Down toward the river. We’ll let the horses drink and maybe take a break.”
He took another quick look, but the landscape was still bare. He started down the slope, moving slowly, letting the horse rest. He wanted to be ready if they had to make a run for it again.
“You think we can get back to El Paso today?” she asked.
That was a question that he didn’t want to answer. He thought that they’d be two or three days getting back to El Paso. They’d have to avoid the direct route because that’s where the Apaches would be. Two or three days, but probably no more than that.
He ignored the question. He kept his eyes moving, searching the horizon and the desert around them for the enemy. He didn’t want to be surprised again.
And he kept looking at the shallow river with the mountains to the north of it. Just as had been described by Crockett’s father.
He noticed that Crockett had spotted it, too. She kept looking back at him and then at the river. Finally she asked, “You think that’s it?”
“It’s close,” he said. “But remember what the diary said. Wagons burned on the bank. And your father mentioned that and bones of the dead.”
“We’re close,” she said. “I know it. I can feel it.”
“But we don’t have the time to look around,” said Travis. “Not with the hostiles running loose.”
She turned toward the river. “We’re this close. We’ve got to take a look.” That was an idea that didn’t appeal to Travis. Not with Apaches running around shooting at everyone. The smart thing was to get out now. Remember where they had been and come back when the Indian problem had been settled.
They reached the valley floor and moved along the bank of the river. There were trees, small trees, along the bank, just as described in the diary, but the trees that the Spaniard had written about would be huge unless they had been swept away in floods. Which would have also carried away the debris of the burned wagons.
“Can’t be here,” said Travis. “Can’t be.”
“Why not?” asked Crockett.
Travis stopped and climbed from the saddle. He stuck a hand into the sand and let it run through his fingers. Nothing. He stood and surveyed the ground. Still nothing.
But the river was shallow, as had been reported in the diary. And there were bluffs opposite, maybe a mile away, and beyond them the mountains.
Travis began walking along the bank, his eyes on the sand. To have found it so quickly, so close to El Paso would mean that others must have found it. And then he realized that no one believed the story. They listened to the prospector spinning his tails of Spanish gold, bought him drinks for the entertainment, and then forgot about it as quickly as possible. They didn’t ride out in search of it.
And he had more information than most. He’d seen the diary and the map and knew what to look for. He knew all the clues. Others only knew some of them.
Crockett stayed mounted, following him slowly. She didn’t say a word now. She, too, was looking for the remains of the wagons, because it would tell them where to cross the river. It would help pinpoint the cave where the gold had been stored by the Apaches.
After fifteen minutes he spotted something partially buried in the sand. He stopped, pulled at it, and came up with a chaired piece of wood.
“Wagon?” asked Crockett.
“Could be anything,” said Travis tossing it away. “Could be anything at all.”
They’d suddenly forgotten about the Apaches that were roaming the desert. They forgot about the firing they’d heard or the danger they were in. Gold fever had driven everything from their minds.
Travis was no longer walking in a straight line. He was weaving over the bank of the river, kicking at the sand. He turned up other chunks of burnt wood and then he stopped and stared. In front of him was a line of wood, and laying near it was the charred remains of a wagon wheel. Sticking up so that one end was two or three inches off the ground, was a bone.
“My God!” said Crockett. ‘This is it.”
Travis looked up at her, his head spinning. He stared at the remains of the wagon, at the shallow river, and the bluffs opposite them and knew that she was right. The gold was hidden in a cave no more than a mile from them. They had found it.
He took a step toward the river and then something made him look back the way they’d come. They might have found the path to the gold, but the Apaches had found them. It was time to get the hell out or die.