Stirrup-to-stirrup, they rode down Congress Avenue toward the imposing bulk of the capitol building. The two riders were nearly identical, mounted on matching bay horses, and although they were not in uniform, they had a distinctly military air about them. If a passerby had thought to look, he might have noticed the star-in-a-circle badge each man wore on his chest, identifying them clearly as Texas Rangers.
Under the eyes of two neatly dressed men idling on a bench, the rangers swung down and, in the absence of a proper hitch rail, tied their horses, one to a side, to the black wrought-iron rails that led up the capitol steps. The larger, gray-haired ranger paused a moment, then bent backward at the waist and groaned as he heard something crack like a handful of twigs. Caleb, he thought to himself, you’re getting to be too damn ancient for this.
Caleb Stringer was a captain in one of the state’s six frontier battalions. Though he was a Tennessee man by birth, the siren call of Texas lured him away from home over thirty years ago, and he’d been a Texan ever since. He served under Captain Jack Hays in the twilight of the ’40s during the Mexican-American War, but, unlike so many others who flocked to the Stars-and-Bars years later, he chose to stay behind and defend against opportunistic Indians and bandits. He had spent most of his life in the saddle and, more than once, nearly perished in it. However brittle he might have felt on this overcast October day, he could still outride and outshoot many a man half his age.
The other fellow, Paul Leduc, was Stringer’s sergeant. An eight-year man, he was a foreigner to Texas as well, a fourth-generation Louisianan—not a Cajun, as were most of his neighbors growing up, but the descendant of a French Huguenot who crossed over in the last century. A stalwart six-footer, habitually clean-shaven, he was younger than the captain by twenty years. Unlike his superior, he had indeed felt the call to go off and serve his country, but, because of Louisiana’s treasonous leanings, he traveled to Kentucky to enlist in a Union-allied regiment. After the war, a short stint as a shotgun guard for Wells Fargo polished his marksmanship. By the time he handed in his resignation, whatever misgivings he’d had of being shot at were gone. When his wanderings brought him to Texas, Leduc found a ranger force in desperate need of fighting men, and himself in need of funds.
The rangers ascended the steps, passing under American and Lone Star flags hanging forlornly in the still, late evening air. One of the two on the bench looked up from his paper as they passed and raised his eyebrows at the sight of their dusty boots and jangling spurs.
Once inside, the rangers had only to identify themselves and were promptly directed to the governor’s office. Neither had a clue as to what Richard B. Hubbard wanted, or how long their audience with him would last, but each man burned with a private curiosity.
The double doors opened after a quick knock, and the governor received them with the warm handshake and winning smile of a true politician. He was tall and heavyset, his bushy brown beard streaked with gray, and clad in a black Prince Albert coat tailored to suit his girth. Leduc thought Hubbard projected a sense of dignity appropriate for a man in his position.
“Hel-lo, gentlemen, and welcome,” Hubbard boomed. “I hope y’all had a pleasant ride in.”
“Pleasant enough,” Stringer replied.
“Can I offer you boys a cigar?”
Stringer accepted one from the proffered box but did not light it, planning, instead, to smoke it on the journey back to headquarters. He was a man who believed that matters at hand came first, leisure second.
When the governor extended the cigar box to Leduc, the younger man shook his head, saying, “Believe I’ll pass, but thank you, sir. I can’t abide the devil-weed.”
Hubbard shrugged, selected one for himself and struck a match against the edge of his mahogany desk. After a few puffs, the stuffy air filling the large room was permeated by the rich scent of Virginia tobacco. “If this is what’s considered devil-weed, gentlemen,” said the governor, waving out the match, “I’d love to see what angel-weed is like.”
Hubbard had been a commander of the 22nd Texas Infantry during the war and afterwards practiced law. He was elected lieutenant governor in ’73 and again three years later, just before assuming the office he held now. Over the course of his term, Hubbard had done a decent job of continuing the previous governor, Richard Coke’s, task of reconstructing postwar Texas, reducing the public debt, promoting educational reform, and stabilizing the state prison system.
Now, in what would be his last few months as governor, Hubbard had apparently decided he owed the state of Texas one last duty.
He motioned for the two lawmen to have a seat opposite his desk, across which were scattered various leather-bound books, sheaves of paper, a walnut metronome, and—perhaps to make an impression—a well-kept but somewhat out of place Colt Dragoon in a flap holster.
As they seated themselves, the governor gave them a good once-over. Both men were dressed in simple garb—homespun shirts and worn leather vests under heavy coats, woolen trousers tucked into the tops of tall boots that had seen better days. Curiously, Leduc had a black silk neckerchief knotted loosely about his throat, the ends tucked down into the collar of his vest for protection. Each carried a knife and a pistol on their belts, the pistols chambered so they could use .44-caliber rifle shells interchangeably. Both men had been deeply tanned by the sun, their skin toughened by harsh llano winds, and they possessed builds that testified of strength and endurance, though Leduc was slightly shorter and leaner than Stringer.
Hubbard cleared his throat. “Well, as you know, gentlemen,” he said, “our fine state suffered greatly in the wake of that ruinous damn war, and, like my predecessor, I’ve had only the very best interests in mind movin’ forward. Governor Coke helped get us up off our hands and knees, and I daresay I’ve helped get us to where we can walk without Yankee hands to guide us.
“We’re doin’ fairly well, for the most part,” he continued, “and the only way left to go is up. You men down on the border have near about got the Indians and the Mexicans whipped back, as I understand it.”
After a short pause, Stringer, sensing that Hubbard was awaiting some sort of reply, said, “Yessir, but we’ve lost many a good man in the doin’. Taken an arrow in the hip and right arm, myself. Sergeant nearly lost his scalp to a Comanche buck one time.”
He wasn’t sure if that was what Hubbard wanted to hear.
Leduc shifted in his seat, wishing the governor would get to the point. Like Stringer, he was ever mindful of his duty, but he appreciated a more direct approach.
“Well, I’m glad to see you both alive and well,” the governor was saying. “And, gents, as good as it is to know the tide’s turning our way, it’s been my continued experience that as soon as one obstacle is taken care of, another springs up in its place.”
He leaned forward, folding his large hands as they came to rest on the desktop. “That’s why I’ve called you men in here.”
They started down the steps nearly an hour later, but not a word was said until they’d seated themselves at a corner table in the local chili joint.
With his back to the hustle and bustle of the kitchen, Sergeant Leduc held a cup of black coffee to his face with both hands, letting the steam warm his cheeks, then smiled as he sipped. There was no color or smile to be found on the captain’s face, though, not even as he carved into his beefsteak. His mind was devoted solely to the commission they had just received—to exterminate the last remnant of Jeb Stuart’s cavalry; to run to ground Gabriel Kings and his Avenging Angels, who had been a plague on this state and others for far too long. That was no small thing to ask, even of lawmen with their accumulated background and experience, but the governor had promised them something well worth the risk. In addition to the government footing the bill for any expenses they required, the state reward of $5,000 would be theirs to split—his and Paul’s—and it didn’t matter if they brought Kings in dead or alive. Texas Rangers made little more than forty dollars a month in state scrip, so the sum was as good as a million to them.
Kings’s most recent heist had yielded a payoff of $20,000. Apparently, that was the straw that finally broke the camel’s back. And so, after a steamier and more financially strenuous summer than usual, the governor had finally been given permission by President Hayes to organize a force fit enough to bring the outlaw gang to justice.
Hubbard had informed Stringer and Leduc that they couldn’t have come more highly recommended. Their names had been touted by Major John B. Jones himself, who was ten years younger than Stringer but a trusted friend, and, coming from such a source, Hubbard said he felt as sure as the Second Coming that no one else could handle the job better than they.
A telegram had come in that very morning from Allan Pinkerton, the renowned founder of the detective agency that bore his name. They had been in communication for some time, these two important men, and the telegram informed the governor that Pinkerton was sending two of his best agents “out West” to lend a hand in the operation, an offer that was only too welcome.
The telegram stated that the Pinkertons would be arriving in Austin tomorrow, on the noon stage. They were to meet Stringer and Leduc at Smith’s Hotel at the corner of Sixth and Congress, and from Austin, they would head out. The guns of the outlaws had been silent since their last big haul, and the word from Refuge, Texas, was that they stopped there for a short time before riding southwest, presumably to their headquarters somewhere in the broken ridges of the Big Bend.
That, then, was the path the lawmen would trace.
Marshal Liddell of Refuge had wired Austin with this information. Apparently, Kings and his men had kept hands in pockets and guns in holsters for the majority of their stay and would likely have passed through unnoticed had it not been for a brief and bloody shooting scrape on their way out. Liddell’s details were sketchy, but the gist of it was that a local saloon owner had fired upon one of the gang with a double-barreled shotgun. Liddell had not informed them of any motive, but the saloon man had been wounded, shot twice by none other than Kings himself.
Leduc was presently shoveling potatoes, steak, and black beans past his teeth with exuberance. He did not once look up at the captain, knowing the time to talk would come. That’s how it was with Stringer—if he wanted to discuss something, he would open his mouth and start. If he didn’t, then a team of oxen couldn’t pull the words from him. The sergeant was happy to let Stringer mull for the time being and hailed the waitress for a refill.
Dishes clattered in the kitchen, and a man at a nearby table roared with laughter.
“Paul?”
There it was. “Sir?”
The waitress appeared, and Stringer kept his thoughts corralled until they had the table to themselves again.
“The governor’s askin’ us to corner seven of the meanest, fightin’est, unreconstructed criminals there is. We’re only two Texas Rangers, and our ranks are stretched thin enough from here to the border. Two Pinkerton men straight off the train from Chicago, Paul, makes four, to tackle this assignment.”
Stringer wagged his head as he drew the cigar from his vest pocket.
“Four guns . . . ridin’ against seven,” he repeated. He popped a match head off his thumbnail and lit up. “We could mebbe look around and muster some extra hands, get a posse goin’. I guess the governor’s offer’d cover it, but, all things considered, I’d say the Spartans had better odds at Thermopylae.”
Leduc took a minute to chew on that. “Well,” he said slowly, “I don’t know much about the Spartans at Thermopylae, but hell, Cap, ever since I’ve been a ranger under you, we’ve always bucked a stacked deck. I don’t see these odds as much better, but they ain’t much worse.”
Stringer considered the glowing tip of his cigar. “Well, then,” he said with a shrug of sober resignation, “what are you gonna do with your half of that state reward?”
The Pinkerton men stepped off the stage onto the streets of Austin a half hour late, the only passengers to have their bags tossed down from above by a bellhop who rushed from the lobby before the dust had a chance to settle.
The rangers—well-rested after a rare night on feather beds—were reclining on the long, whitewashed bench on the hotel veranda, arguing as they had a dozen times about the pros and cons of the newer, lightweight, rimfire model of six-gun that Leduc preferred, versus those of the older, heavier, cap-and-ball model once favored by Stringer. Out of practicality, the captain had been forced to give up the Dragoon and now carried an unassuming 1875 Model Remington, blued and walnut-handled, which again put him at odds with Leduc, who wore a pearl-handled Colt with a nickel finish. Some arguments are never to be won, and Stringer decided this was one of them.
It was he who first noticed the two new arrivals disembarking from the four-horse coach. The first was a somber-featured man of about forty years, just under six feet tall and stoutly built, with turkey-tracked blue eyes and a close-cropped beard. He was dressed like a dude, his checkered coat, waistcoat, and trousers rumpled and dusty from the long trip. To all appearances, here was a fish that had swum too far downriver, but the formality of his suit concealed two service wounds, and his coat was unbuttoned at the bottom for faster access to his side-arm.
By contrast, his partner was short and slender with a dark coat-hanger mustache and a much younger face. Though his expression was vacant, his eyes carried a faint light of amusement as he took in his surroundings, as though he found it amazing that places like this still existed. He was dressed almost identically to the first man, though in pinstripes, and he did not appear to be heeled.
Stringer stood to meet the pair as they started up the steps. The newcomers halted as their eyes came to rest on the ranger badge, and, though there was no need for him to ask, the captain did. “You the Pinkertons?”
“That’s right,” the older of the two replied in an authoritative but strangely high voice. “You the rangers?”
“That’s right.”
“My name’s Mincey. This is my partner—”
“Patrick Delaney,” the dark-haired Pinkerton offered, shedding his straight face for a disarming smile. “Pat, better known. How d’you do?”
“Howdy. I’m Captain Stringer; this is Sergeant Leduc.”
“Glad to meetcha both,” Mincey said. “Pat and I need to see to our rooms, but maybe you’d wanna wait for us in the lobby. We should be down directly, then we can get to work.”
Stringer nodded and a short while later found himself and the others gathered around a table at the chili joint wherein he and Paul had taken supper the night before.
Walter Mincey was an Illinois man, formerly a cooper, and had served briefly in a short-lived organization known as the Union Intelligence Service. After learning the tricks of the investigative trade from Pinkerton himself, Mincey assumed various roles, ranging from barroom Confederate sympathizer to uniformed soldier, collecting intelligence deep behind enemy lines. Following the surrender, he joined the newly formed agency of his now close friend, the aforementioned Pinkerton. Many years and some dozen assignments later, Mincey held the rank of senior agent.
Delaney, the son of Irish immigrants, had been too young to serve in any military capacity but was, fortunately for him, born in the same city that served as Pinkerton headquarters. He had been in their employ for the last seven of his thirty years, seeing investigative action abroad in Missouri and Kansas. By nature, he was affable, the last one anybody would expect to wear the badge of a Pinkerton detective or carry a pistol in a shoulder holster. He knew how to wield the respect that came with both.
Once their lunch had been set aside, the four lawmen talked through the day and into the evening, the rangers informing the Pinkertons as to whom they had been charged with apprehending. Each man realized that the fugitives were essentially the ultimate outlaw band—war veterans, hardened by years of living and fighting with cannons booming and bullets whizzing in their ears. They knew every canyon, arroyo, ravine, holler, nook, and cranny in which to hide, from the Mason-Dixon all the way to the Rocky Mountains. They were known to ride some of the best horses ever foaled, these so-called Avenging Angels, better than the average posseman could afford. Dozens had tried and dozens had failed to apprehend them. Tough lawmen went pale at the idea of pursuing the gang into the Big Bend, and even the small details of soldiers that patrolled the neighboring area fought shy of the Chisos foothills.
They were the very best at their trade, having stolen an estimated half-million dollars from the pocket of the U.S. government. It was an amount to rival any sum stolen by their peers, the now defunct James-Younger gang.
Stringer was looked upon to assume command of the small bunch of lawmen, as he was not only an officer in the rangers, but a man who knew best what Kings was inclined to do, where he would be inclined to go. He suggested they ride west to Refuge, have a word with the local law, round up all the facts they could, and see if a posse could be rousted into saddling up with them.
The four parted company around seven o’clock that night, the rangers bound for the general store, where they stocked up on supplies—not too light but not too heavy, either. They would be traveling hard and fast, and a pack mule or horse would only slow them down. Only the bare essentials were procured and added to the state tab.
Simultaneously, the Chicago lawmen secured for themselves a pair of horses—a lineback dun for Mincey and a seal-brown mare for Delaney. They also purchased two cast-off saddles, paid the hostler with a check, then took a trip to the local armory. From a rack on the back wall Delaney and Mincey hefted Winchester carbines and signed over what was asked for them. And so, cradling these weapons, the detectives retired to the hotel for the last good night’s sleep they would have in a while.
Before the morning sun broke, the rangers were met at the city limits by the Pinkertons, astride their new mounts. Wordlessly, the four horsemen strung out in a single file line—Stringer riding point, followed by Mincey, who was in turn followed by Delaney. Leduc brought up the rear.
They rode west.
Four men trooped through the front doors of a certain Refuge saloon, dusty from travel and with an air about them that narrowed their line of work to a handful of seedy options. Ned Spivey watched them head to the bar from a corner table. His bandaged left leg protruded to the side, propped on a chair and causing him no end of grief. His left hand was filled with a tall glass of local, and his right arm hung in a sling.
The men—two whites, one who could have been a breed, and a john henry—leaned their rifles muzzle-up below the counter and ordered four drinks. The bartender poured three, hesitating when it came to the john henry. One quick look and a nod from Spivey filled the glass.
He waited until the barkeep served them once more and until the last of them swallowed before clearing his throat. Raising his good arm, glass still in hand, Spivey called out, “Could I have a word, gents?”
As one, the four turned to see who had hailed them. Only after they’d taken his measure, seeing he was virtually half a man, did they begin their approach.
The first one was just below average in height and slight of build, but, even so, he gave the distinct impression of being the head man. Flanking him was the half-breed and the big, scar-faced tough-nut who looked like he could bring steers down by the horns. The john henry was positioned a little ways apart from his companions, hinting at a certain intolerance, that the only reason he put up with them was to have three extra guns on his side. Not that he looked like he needed them.
They would do, he decided. They sure as hell would.
“You Spivey?” the head man asked in a gravelly voice.
“That’s right. You Wingate?”
“That’s right.” He drew himself up, nodding to each of his men in turn. “These are my associates—Carver, Lightfoot, and Coleman.”
“Telegram took long enough to find you fellas.”
“Well, it found us.”
“Uh-huh.Y’all come highly recommended.”
“And who done the recommendin’?”
“Friend of mine. Pete Hooker.”
Wingate thought a moment. “Cardsharp outta Jacksboro?”
“Fort Griffin.”
Wingate grunted. “What can we do fer ye, Mr. Spivey?”
The saloon man left Wingate’s question hanging for a moment. He took a drink, set the glass down, then flicked an ant from the tabletop. He stared up at them.
“You can set down and tell me what you know of Gabriel Kings.”