“You refuse to let your woman intercede for you?” Escalante said. “I would expect no less of a true man.”
Gabriel turned back to him. “What do we fight with? Pistols? Machetes? Or a good old-fashioned bare knuckles brawl?”
“None of those,” Escalante said with a shake of his head. “Bullwhips.”
Tomás grinned.
“Bullwhips?” Gabriel repeated.
All the bandits were grinning now. One of them went into a hut and brought out a couple of coiled whips of plaited leather.
“Oh, Gabriel!” Cierra threw her arms around his neck and hugged him hard. In his ear, she whispered, “I tried to warn you, you fool! I remember hearing about Tomás when I was a little girl. He can take out a man’s eyes with a whip! He’ll cut you to ribbons!”
Gabriel reached up to stroke her hair as she embraced him. “It’s all right,” he whispered. His mouth was dry, but not too dry for him to add, “I learned to use a bullwhip when I was a boy. An old friend of my father’s taught me.”
“A friend of…? Wasn’t your father some sort of Classics professor?”
“Trust me,” Gabriel said.
He let go of her and stepped back, then reached out to take the whip that was offered to him. His fingers closed around the long handle. It was made of wood with strips of leather wrapped around it. With a flick of his wrist he shook out the whip itself, made of more long strips, braided together. It coiled and writhed at his feet like a snake.
“Oh, ho, Tomás,” Escalante said. “It looks like our American friend has held a whip before.”
Tomás spat, and if ever such a gesture could be eloquent, this one was. His contempt was obvious. He snapped his wrist, and the whip he held leaped into the air like it was alive before jumping back with a sharp crack that sounded like a gunshot.
Gabriel could have cracked his whip, too, but he didn’t see any point in showing off. He had probably done a little too much of that already, just by not feigning awkwardness when he was handed the whip.
“If you survive this, Gabriel,” Escalante said, using the name Cierra had called him, “then you deserve to live.”
“Then this is a fight to the death?” Gabriel said.
Tomás spoke for the first time, in a voice like ten miles of gravel road. “For you it is.”
Cierra reached for Gabriel again, but Escalante took hold of her arm and pulled her back before she could get to him. The rest of the men backed off as well, giving Gabriel and Tomás plenty of room in the middle of the clearing.
Once they started swinging those bullwhips, they would need the room.
Tomás struck first, lashing out with the whip. Gabriel had seen the flare of anger in the man’s eyes and the bunching of the muscles in his shoulders, and that was all the warning he needed to leap aside. As he moved he snapped his wrist and sent his whip darting toward Tomás. The stocky bandit was incredibly fast for a man of his bulk, though. Gabriel’s first strike missed just as Tomás’s had.
Tomás drew his whip in and began to circle slowly, forcing Gabriel to circle as well. Then with a grunt he attacked again, this time going for Gabriel’s legs. Gabriel tried to dart out of the way, but the very tip of the bullwhip struck his calf and left behind a line of fiery pain when it snapped back. Gabriel glanced down and saw that the whip had sliced right through his jeans.
Tomás rushed him then, snapping the whip high over-head. If the weighted tip caught him in the eye, it would be over, Gabriel knew. He flung up his left arm, felt the vicious bite of the whip against his flesh as it cut through his sleeve.
Holding his right arm down low, he flicked his wrist and sent his whip leaping out again. It slid in underneath Tomás’s guard and cut the bandit across his belly. Tomás howled in pain and anger but didn’t pause or stop pressing his attack. Gabriel spun to one side and cracked his whip. This time it struck Tomás’s thick left thigh and drew blood.
Gabriel was vaguely aware of the other bandits yelling encouragement to Tomás. From the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of Cierra standing beside Escalante, her face twisted with lines of fear. She was saying something, but he couldn’t take the time to make it out, because Tomás was coming at him again.
Gabriel watched the man’s arm swing back, gauged where his whip was aimed, and then swung his own to meet it, the lengths of braided leather meeting in mid air, twining around one another. Gabriel yanked fiercely, hoping to pull the handle out of Tomás’s hand, but the stocky man held tight, pulling back mightily and almost overbalancing Gabriel, who stumbled forward. He caught himself with his free hand, the fresh cut on his forearm stinging. With his other hand, he swung the whip handle in a tight circle, desperately trying to untangle his whip from Tomás’s. He saw the other man doing the same, and after a second the two whips slid apart. Each man drew his in, eyeing the other warily.
Tomás raised his arm and with a practiced flick shot the leather at him. Gabriel ducked under the slashing whip and suddenly drove forward, burying the top of his head in Tomás’s bleeding gut. He pushed with all the strength in his legs and knocked Tomás backward. The bandit lost his footing and fell, crashing down hard on his back.
Gabriel landed on top of him, planting a knee in Tomás’s belly. Tomás was red-faced and gasping from the fall. Gabriel didn’t give his opponent the chance to catch his breath. He made a loop with his whip and twisted it around Tomás’s neck, then scrambled around behind the bandit to tighten the noose, twisting with the wooden handle to turn it into a makeshift tourniquet. Grunting with the strain, Gabriel rose to his feet, lifting Tomás with him and making the whip sink deeper and deeper into the flesh of the man’s neck.
Tomás flailed with his free hand, swinging behind him, but the blows he landed didn’t reach Gabriel with enough force to do any damage. Not so the bullwhip in Tomás’s other hand, which danced and weaved around Gabriel, snapping and popping and bloodying him in half a dozen places. His thick work shirt was swiftly sliced through and his back would have been as well, had it not been for the extra padding of the regimental flag hidden beneath his shirt. But the whip cut cruelly into his sides and shoulders, landing for an instant, then moving on to strike again somewhere else. Gabriel ignored the pain and hung on, planting one knee in the other man’s back for leverage.
He had held his own in the contest so far, but he knew if he gave Tomás enough chances the man would eventually kill him.
This fight had to end here and now.
As Gabriel gritted his teeth and looked over Tomás’s shoulder, he saw several of the bandits pointing guns at him with angry expressions on their faces. They didn’t like seeing their compadre on the brink of defeat, and at the hands of a gringo, at that.
But Paco Escalante motioned for them to lower their weapons, and grudgingly, the bandits did so. After what seemed like an eternity, Tomás stopped fighting. His muscles went limp, and the bullwhip slipped from his nerveless fingers. Gabriel didn’t think the bandit was shamming. Tomás wouldn’t have let go of his bullwhip if he were still conscious. Instantly, Gabriel let off on the pressure he’d been exerting with his whip and allowed Tomás’s ungainly form to slump to the ground at his feet.
If ever the other bandits were going to shoot him, it would be now.
Escalante motioned his men back, though, and came forward, bringing Cierra with him. He gestured toward Tomás, who lay there out cold but still breathing, and said, “You did not kill him. It was supposed to be a fight to death.”
Gabriel was a little out of breath himself. “Didn’t see…any need to,” he said.
Escalante reached to the holster on his hip and drew a revolver from it. “You seek to gain favor with me by sparing one of my men when you could have killed him?” The gun rose to point at Gabriel. “You think I know mercy? That may have been the worst mistake you ever made, amigo…and the last.”