The Alamosa Trail Read online

  DESEADO PARA ASESINATO

  DIEZ MIL RECOMPENSES DEL PESO.

  POLICIA FEDERAL MEJICANO DEL CONTACTO

  Chad removed the poster. That night, when they made camp, he showed it to Jim.

  “What do you think this means?”

  “I don’t know,” Jim said. He studied it for a moment, then said, “From the way it’s put together, I’d say it is a wanted poster. Look at the bottom line, poli . . . polisee-ah,” he struggled with the word, then said, “Policia. Police. Federal police. And this last word: contacto. Contact, you think?”

  “Mejicano,” Chad said, “must mean Mexican.”

  “Contact the Mexican Federal Police,” Jim said.

  The others, made curious by Jim and Chad’s secretive conversation, came over to see what was going on.

  “What you boys ponderin’ over?” Barry asked.

  “Chad found this today,” Jim said, showing him the poster.

  “What the hell?” Tennessee asked. “You think that’s our Ortega?”

  “Ours? You ready to claim him now?” Ken asked.

  The others laughed.

  “You know what I mean,” Ken said, a little miffed at being teased.

  “You have to admit, it does look a little like him,” Gene said.

  “Yeah, looks like him, and like every Mexican we’ve come across since we came down into this godforsaken land,” Gene insisted.

  “Well, there’s no gettin’ around one thing, and that is the fact that the fella on this poster is named Hector Ortega, and so is our trail boss. And the drawing of this Hector Ortega looks a lot like the man we’re trailin’ with,” Tennessee said. “So I figure it’s something we ought to find out about.”

  Ortega, who was at that moment eating from a can of beans, realized that the others were engaged in some sort of discussion. He had no idea what the subject of the conversation was, but knew it must be about him because he heard his name, and they kept looking over toward him.

  “Senors,” he finally asked, “what are you doing?”

  “Are you goin’ to tell him?” Ken asked.

  “Tell him?” Jim replied. He shook his head. “I’m not going to tell him a damn thing, because I don’t know what to tell him. I reckon I’ll just have to come right out and ask him.”

  Jim took the paper over to Ortega and showed it to him.

  “Have you seen this?”

  “Sí.” Ortega ate another spoonful of beans before he spoke again, answering in a very nonchalant voice. “Many times I have seen this poster.”

  “Is this supposed to be a picture of you?” Jim pointed to the drawing.

  Ortega rubbed his hand across his cheek. “I do not think it looks very much like me,” he said.

  “The name on the poster is Hector Ortega. That is your name, isn’t it?”

  “Sí, that is my name. But it is also the name of many of my people. In Mexico the name Hector Ortega is like the name Bill Smith in America. There are many, many people with that name.”

  Jim studied the line drawing for a moment longer, then he looked very closely at Ortega. Finally he shook his head. “I guess you’re right. But tell me what the words say.”

  “Dead or alive,” Ortega said, indicating the large words at the top. “The name, Hector Ortega, you have already read. The other words read, ‘Wanted for murder. Ten thousand peso reward. Contact the federal police.’ ”

  “Yes, the part about contact the federal police part we figured out for ourselves,” Jim said.

  The other Americans had drifted over as well to listen to Ortega’s translation.

  “You say this isn’t you,” Barry began. “Do you know who this other fella with your name is?”

  Ortega shook his head. “It could be anyone,” he said. He smiled. “Perhaps one of the bandidos we killed yesterday is the man in this poster. If so, we are ten thousand pesos richer today.”

  “Not we, you,” Jim said. “You are the one who killed those men. I wanted no part of it then, and I want no part of it now.”

  Ever since dark, Katie Kincaid had been working diligently to untie her hands. It was a difficult task, not only because Whitey, who had tied Katie and her two daughters, was good with rope but also because she had to be very still and quiet lest she give away what she was doing. By the time she finally managed to get her hands free, she estimated that it was a little after midnight. Even though her hands were now free, she kept her wrists crossed on top of her body so that it would appear to the casual observer in the dark that she was still securely tied.

  She could hear the troubled but even breathing of her two daughters, so she knew they were both sleeping. By the loud snoring coming from the other side of the small clearing, she could tell that Shardeen and Whitey were fast asleep as well. It was Red’s time to be on guard. Several minutes earlier she had overheard Red coming on guard, and Shardeen going off.

  “You stay awake. Keep the fire goin’, and keep a close eye on them women,” Shardeen had ordered.

  “You don’t have to worry none about me,” Red replied.

  “And stay the hell away from ’em,” Shardeen ordered.

  “I ain’t goin’ to bother the girls none.” Red rubbed himself, then looked toward the three slumbering women.

  “I ain’t talkin’ about just the girls. I mean I want you to stay away from their mama, too,” Shardeen said. “I’m tired, and I don’t want my sleep ruined by listening to you grunt and her squeal.”

  “Two, three more times and ’bout the only squealin’ she’ll be doin’ is when she’s tellin’ me how much she’s likin’ it,” Red bragged.

  “Mind what I say,” Shardeen said. “I don’t want to get woke up.”

  “Go on, then. Go to sleep and quit gabbin’ about it.”

  When, a moment later, Red came over to look at the three captives, Katie made no movement nor uttered any sound that would suggest she was awake. She had her eyes nearly closed, so much so that in the flickering yellow light of the campfire, Red couldn’t tell that she was actually looking at him through narrowed slits. Satisfied that all were asleep, Red gathered several sticks of dry wood and fed the campfire. The burning wood began to pop and snap as the flames grew larger. The bubble of golden light and warmth extended farther from the fire.

  If Katie was ever going to make good her plan to escape, now was the time to put it into operation. Her plan depended upon two things: being able to get her hands free, and finding the opportunity to get Red alone. Just as he was, right now.

  Red was perfect for her plan, because out of their three captors, he was the one who seemed most driven by primordial instincts. He was constantly badgering Shardeen to take a break for food or the toilet, and to allow him to gratify himself sexually with Katie. And while after the first couple of times Whitey and Shardeen’s sexual appetites were reduced, Red was as eager now as he had been when the women were first captured.

  Red was also the slowest of wit. Shardeen and Whitey were constantly explaining the most basic things to him.

  The third and final reason was the fact that Red used a cross draw. He wore his pistol on the left side of his gun belt, with the handle facing forward. That was an important element in Katie’s plan.

  “Red?” Katie whispered in the dark.

  “What? Who’s there?” Red replied.

  “Shhh,” Katie said. “Do you want to wake Shardeen?”

  Red got up from the rock and walked over to look down at her. “What do you want?” he asked.

  “Shhh!” Katie said again. “Speak softly, Red,” she said. “Whisper. Otherwise you’ll wake the others and we can’t have our fun.”

  “Fun?”

  “Do you think you are the only one who enjoys it when we have sex?”

  A shocked expression lighted up Red’s face. Then he turned toward his two sleeping partners. He held up his finger as if making a point. “Damnation! I told Shardeen . . .” Red started to say out loud.

  “Shhh! You must whis
per.”

  “I told Shardeen you was goin’ to come around to likin’ it,” Red whispered lasciviously.

  “Oh, honey, I liked it the first time,” Katie said.

  “You sure didn’t act like it.”

  “I had to pretend. I didn’t want my daughters to know how much I liked it,” Katie said. “They wouldn’t understand. They are too young to know how good it can be when you are with a real man. Someone like you, I mean.”

  “I’ll be damned. I knowed it was somethin’ like that.” Red began rubbing himself fla grantly now.

  “Oh, you don’t have to play with yourself, Red. We could have some fun right now, just the two of us,” Katie said. “And if we are quiet about it, nobody would ever have to know. Not my two daughters, not Whitey, and especially not Shardeen.”

  “Yeah,” Red said, smiling. He started toward her, then he stopped and looked at her suspiciously, as if he suspected she might be trying something sly. “I ain’t goin’ to untie you,” he said.

  “All right, you don’t have to untie me. But you will pull up my skirt and pull down my drawers, won’t you? As long as my hands are tied, I can’t do it myself.”

  “Yeah,” Red repeated. “I sure will pull up your skirt and pull down your drawers.”

  Kneeling beside her, Red helped her undress, pulling her clothes down below her knees. Her naked white flesh gleamed softly in the moonlight.

  “Oh, honey, I’m no fire for you,” Kate moaned in a low, throaty voice.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Red said. He was breathing in ragged gasps as he began to move over her.

  “Wait, aren’t you going to untie my ankles?”

  “Why should I do that?”

  “Oh, honey, believe me, it will be so much better for you if you will untie my ankles. It will let me spread my legs wider for you. You do want me to spread my legs for you, don’t you?”

  “Yeah, spread your legs,” Red grunted, as he bent down to untie her ankles.

  “Hurry, don’t keep me waiting for you any longer,” Katie said, spreading her legs in invitation once her ankles were untied.

  Red knelt between Katie’s wide-spread legs. Then he unbuttoned his pants and started to mount her. At that moment Katie slipped her hand from the loose coil of rope that was around her wrists, wrapped her fingers around the handle of Red’s pistol, slipped it from his holster, shoved the barrel of the gun into his belly and pulled the trigger.

  Red’s body muffled the gunshot, so instead of a loud bang, it was more like the pop of a log in the fire. But the shot itself propelled Red off Katie so she was able to sit up.

  “Mama?” Marilou said.

  “Shhh!” Katie said. “Be quiet.” Pulling her drawers up and her skirt down, Katie moved over to Marilou and began untying her, all the while keeping an eye on the still-sleeping forms of Whitey and Shardeen.

  Marilou untied her own ankles as Katie began untying Brenda’s hands.

  Once Brenda’s hands were free the girls, cautioned by Katie to be as silent as possible, worked quickly and quietly to get their own horses saddled.

  Once the three horses were saddled, Katie walked back over to Red’s body. Leaning over him, she undid his gun belt and slipped it off his waist. Both Marilou and Brenda thought she was going to keep it. Instead, she dropped it into the fire. Then she hurried back to her horse.

  “Get mounted,” she said quietly. “But just walk them slowly for now. When the excitement starts, ride as fast as you can.”

  “What excitement, Mama?” Brenda asked.

  “You’ll see,” Katie promised.

  The three women started riding slowly and quietly out of the camp. They were about fifty yards away when the cartridges in Red’s gun-belt started going off, activated by the heat of the campfire.

  It sounded as if an army had invaded, with the shots occurring so rapidly as to be on top of each other. Looking back toward the camp, the three women could see sparks flying from the fire. They could also see Shardeen and Whitey rolling around on the ground, with their arms covering their heads.

  “Ahh! What the hell! We surrender! We surrender!” Shardeen shouted.

  The outlaws’ three unsaddled horses soon came galloping by the women. The horses, whinnying loudly with flared nostrils, had been terrified by the sudden and unexpected noise in the middle of the night. Katie knew they would run for miles before calming down. Shardeen and Whitey would be left afoot, deep in the mountains of northern Mexico.

  Over the last few days, Katie had seen her husband and son murdered. She had been raped, she’d watched fear grow in the eyes of her two young daughters, and she had just been forced to kill another human being. If someone had told her one week ago that she would have to endure such an ordeal, she would not have believed herself capable of surviving.

  But she had survived. And now, with bullets popping, Shardeen and Whitey screaming in fear, and the outlaws’ horses galloping off into the night, she was actually able to enjoy one of the best laughs of her entire life.

  Chapter 11

  In the churchyard of the Mexican town of Chihuahua, Father Sanchez began the funeral prayer of commitment as two women stepped up to the open graves and dropped dirt onto the coffins of the dead. The women, the widows of the two slain policemen, were dressed in black with their faces covered by veils.

  Capitán Bustamante stood a little way behind the mourners, holding his hat in his hand as the funeral ended. As the two widows were leaving the graveyard, he stepped out to confront them.

  “Senoras,” he said in a solemn voice, “this, I promise you: The men who murdered your husbands will pay for this crime with their own blood.”

  The older of the two women, Senora Montoya, stopped and looked at Bustamante through eyes that were bloodshot and red-rimmed from crying. For a long, uncomfortable moment, she held him with her stare. Finally, in a low, woeful voice, she spoke.

  “And when these men are dead, Capitán, will our husbands be returned to us?” she asked.

  Bustamante blinked his eyes a few times, surprised by the woman’s response.

  “No, and for that I am sorry.”

  “Then do not speak to me of murderers paying in blood. Their lives will bring me no comfort. Not if it does not bring my husband back to me,” Senora Montoya insisted.

  Father Sanchez hurried over to comfort the two widows. He flashed Bustamante an admonishing glance. “My son, do not speak of more killing in this holy place,” he said.

  Bustamante left the churchyard. Behind him in the church belfry, a muffled bell tolled once for each year lived by the two slain policemen, thirty-two times for Montoya, twenty-eight for Arino. The bell tolls could be heard all over the town, and when Bustamante walked through the plaza, he saw that many were standing with their hats held reverently across their chests as they waited for the funeral to end.

  The tolling didn’t cease until Bustamante was in his office. He hung his sombrero on a peg, then glanced over at his deputy, Lieutenant, or Teniente, Santos.

  “How was the funeral?” Santos asked.

  “Very sad.”

  From outside, they could hear the hoofbeats of a galloping horse.

  “Someone is in a great hurry,” Bustamante said.

  “Listen, someone is shouting,” Santos said.

  “Senor Capitán! Senor Capitán!”

  Bustamante looked through the front window of the office. “It is Jose Meras.”

  The rider stopped in front of the police station then swung down from the saddle, just as Bustamante and Santos came outside to see what it was about.

  “Capitán Bustamante, the men who killed Montoya and Arino,” Meras shouted excitedly. “It was seven gringos and one Mexican. They have been seen!”

  “Where?”

  “In the mountains, near the village of Escalon.”

  “Escalon?” Bustamante turned to Santos. “Teniente Santos, who is in charge of the police at Escalon?” he asked.

  “Sargento Gonzales.”
/>   “Only a sargento? No officers?”

  “It is a very small station, senor,” Santos replied.

  “Very well. I will send a telegram to Sargento Gonzales, telling him that these men may be coming to his village.”

  “Gonzales has but one man assigned to him, Capitán,” Santos said. “I do not think he can arrest eight men.”

  “All the better. I will tell him to take no action, but just to observe them until we get there. After all, why give the glory to a mere sargento, when, by rights, it should be ours to claim. Santos, call the company together,” Bustamante ordered. “We are going after the murderers.”

  “Sí, senor! Why give the credit to a mere sargento?” Santos replied with a big smile on his face.

  Chickens squawked and scurried to get out of the way as Jim Robison and his friends followed Hector Ortega across the plaza of the little village of Escalon. A couple of men who were lazing in the shade, their sombreros shielding their eyes, made no effort to move as the riders passed within a few feet of them. An old woman was drawing water in the middle of the plaza and Jim and the others rode over to the well and dismounted. Without having to ask for it, the old woman offered her dipper to them.

  “Gracias,” Jim said, taking the dipper. He drank deeply, then passed the dipper over to the others. Only Ortega didn’t drink from the well. Instead, he sat in his saddle in silence, watching the others.

  “I know the son of a bitch don’t talk,” Tennessee said. “But don’t he drink water?”

  “Mujer, trae agua,” Ortega said to the old woman at the well.

  “Sí, senor,” the old woman replied. Filling the dipper with water, she carried it over to Ortega and handed it up to him.

  Ortega drank thirstily.

  “Maybe the son of a bitch thinks he is too good to get his own water,” Tennessee said.

  Ortega tossed away the remaining few drops, then handed the dipper back to the old woman. He looked directly at Tennessee.