“My point,” Hijino said, “is that there are only five of you.” With blinding speed, he straightened and fired, five shots one after the other. Julio and the other vaqueros were taken completely off guard. Julio’s forehead exploded, and he toppled. The faces of the next two vaqueros erupted in scarlet. Only the last two had split seconds in which to smother their astonishment and stab for their revolvers, but neither cleared leather. All of them were dead and on the ground before the sound of the shots faded.
Timmy was rooted with horror and fear. He had never seen anyone draw and shoot so fast. Not even Jesco.
Hijino reloaded again. He spun the pearl-handled Colt into his holster, then clucked to his white horse. As he went past Julio Pierce, he grinned and said, “They make it too easy.”
Timmy had a clear shot at the killer’s back. He did not draw. His fingers curled and his hand twitched, but he did not move until Hijino was across the Rio Largo and a speck in the haze. Then, and only then, did he swing onto his horse and race like a madman for the Circle T.
Chapter 20
Trella was in her bedroom, facedown on her pillow, when there came a light knock at her door. She sat up stiffly, too devastated by the loss of her mother to care how she looked. “Come in.”
It was Dolores. She came to the bed, but did not sit. Her complexion was ghastly, as pale as the sheets under the bedspread on which Trella lay.
“If it is more bad news, I do not want to hear it.” Trella did not think she could take any more. She wanted to curl into a ball and weep for a week.
“Brace yourself.”
“Dear God. There is more?”
Dolores spoke as one in a daze. “Hijino has just brought word. Julio is dead. Circle T cowboys killed him.”
Numb with horror, Trella nearly fainted. She had loved him most of all her siblings, in part because they were the youngest, in part because they were so much alike. More tears gushed from eyes she would have sworn were cried out, and she choked for breath.
“Steve is waiting for the last of the men to come in from the range,” Dolores continued in her bizarrely calm manner.
Trella sought to blink back the new deluge, and failed.
“Armando is mad at him. Armando wanted to leave sooner with the men already here, but Steve refused. Now Armando blames Steve for Julio’s death.”
“Can it get any worse?” Trella mewed.
“The last of our vaqueros will arrive within the hour,” Dolores said, still in that strange manner. “Then they are heading across the river. There will be more killing. A lot more.” She paused and licked her lips. “I thought you should know.”
“Thank you.”
Dolores turned to go. She took a step, but staggered and had to reach for the wall table for support.
Between sobs, Trella asked, “Do you need help?”
“No,” Dolores replied. But she did not move. She leaned there, her head bowed, her disheveled hair hiding her face.
“Maybe you should sit down,” Trella suggested. She moved back from the edge of the bed to make room.
Nodding, Dolores slowly eased down. She was misery incarnate, broken in spirt and body.
“Are you sure you are all right?” The smell of wine crinkled Trella’s nose. “You have been drinking.” She knew her sister was fond of the juice of the grape, and enjoyed a glass or two every night before retiring. “How much have you had?”
“A bottle or two,” Dolores said without looking up. “I started and couldn’t stop. Now I have none left. Do you have any?”
“I think you have had enough.” Trella gently rested her hand on Dolores’s shoulder. “Lie down and I will have a servant bring coffee to clear your head.”
Dolores’s hair moved from side to side. “I do not want coffee. I do not want a clear head. I want to take a pistola and put it to my temple and squeeze the trigger, that is what I want.”
“Don’t talk like that.”
“Hasn’t it sunk in yet? Mother is gone. Forever. She was everything to me. I loved her with all my heart and all my soul.”
“And I did not?” Trella asked defensively.
“You were always closer to father. But what does it matter? We have lost both of them, and now Julio. There are just the four of us left, and if Steve and Armando go to the Circle T, we might lose them, too. The Circle T has more cowboys than we have vaqueros.”
“What if”—Trella was jarred by a possibility that had not occurred to her—“what if the cowboys attack our rancho while our brothers are off attacking the Circle T? Who will protect us?”
“They would not stoop so low as to slay unarmed women.”
“They killed Mother,” Trella bitterly reminded her. Until this moment, she had not been afraid for her own life. Now the fear was like a lance thrust deep into her chest. “They will stop at nothing. They are out to destroy the DP.”
Dolores was quiet for a bit. Then she slid off the bed, saying, “Come with me.” Without waiting, she walked unsteadily into the hall.
Trella hurried after her, patting her hair and wiping her cheeks with her sleeve. “Where are we going?”
Dolores did not answer. Presently they came to the kitchen. Steve and Armando were there, seated across from one another.
Paco and Roman and a pair of nervous vaqueros were waiting by the door. They all took off their sombreros.
“So it is settled,” Steve was saying. “We hit them hard and fast. Strike and run, again and again, until we have whittled their numbers.”
“It is cowardly,” Armando said.
Steve disagreed. “It is smart. There aren’t enough of us. Our only hope is to wear them down without losing a lot of our own men.” Steve’s jaw muscles twitched. “They have an advantage, but we have justice on our side.”
“I am glad you have come to your senses, and I do agree we must strike quickly,” Armando said. “There can be no doubt they mean to wipe us out. They are not content with half the valley. They want it all.”
Dolores stopped at the kitchen table. “Trella and I are coming with you,” she announced.
“Be serious, sister,” Armando said.
“Think, hermano, think,” Dolores snapped. “They have killed Mother. As Trella points out, what is to stop them from killing the two of us while you are away? With all the vaqueros gone, we would not stand a chance.”
“Surely they would not,” Armando said, and then scowled and rumbled deep in his throat like a bear at bay. “No. I must stop deceiving myself. The rules of civilized society are nothing to them. You are right. If they caught you two unprotected, your lives would be forfeit.”
“They murdered Mother,” Trella brought up again as confirmation. She gazed out the window, imagining how it must have been for Juanita: abducted from her home, forced to ride north, dying of a broken neck. A thought struck her, and she gasped. “How did they know?”
“I beg your pardon?” Armando said.
“How did they know it was safe to take Mother? That everyone else was asleep? Did they take it for granted? Or were they watching our casa? Are they watching our casa now?”
“We would see them if they were out there,” Steve remarked.
“Not if they were a long way off,” Trella said. “Not if they are using a spyglass like the one Senor Tovey has.”
Armando came out of his chair. “She is right! Remember when he showed it to us? A cowboy could be out there right this minute.”
“What about his horse?” Steve was skeptical. “We can spot horses and cows from a long way off.”
“Not if they are lying down,” Armando noted, “and horses can be taught to do that. Remember the cowboy at the last rodeo? The one who taught his horse all those tricks?”