I reached down for the pouch and pulled it up after me. Rolling over, I clutched it to my body and went limp. The last thing I did before passing into a deep sleep was give that old beat-up leather pack a long, hard kiss.
I must have laid there a full hour or so before I was finally able to continue on. I got up and brushed myself off, grateful the climb was over. It was downhill all the way now, with a clear view of the valley below.
Unfortunately, before I got even halfway down into the valley, I knew the camp had been deserted. Buzzards circled the corpses of several dead horses and what little was left of Joaquin and Chango’s wagons had been burned into two ashen piles.
Tracks left by the herd led out of the valley and away to the southwest. I found still others made by a smaller group heading back southeast, opposite our original direction. The double sets of furrows behind this second group spoke volumes. After the camp had been attacked and the herd rustled, the vaqueros must have turned back toward San Rafael, carrying their wounded on horse-drawn travois.
I came upon three fresh gravesites, not far from the burned out wagons. Inscriptions had been crudely carved into a piece of wood nailed to a tree branch. The first one read simply: JOAQUIN GUTTIEREZ—NUESTRO COCINERO Y AMIGO.
I shook my head sadly and moved on to the other two. The sentiment on these markers was quite different. asesino y ladrón was all that had been recorded, but then murderer and thief said it all anyway.
I rummaged around the remains of both wagons and found two sacks of beans that were only slightly singed, and half a sack of cornmeal. There were also three or four canteens lying around that could still hold water. There weren’t any horses left alive and the only rifle I could find was too badly damaged to be of any use.
I scavenged what little I could from the camp while all the time looking for clues as to how the attack had occurred and who might be responsible. The herd had trampled most of the area and any remaining sign had been spoiled by the fire.
It did seem, though, that the vaqueros had been caught totally by surprise, and I found that very unusual. This valley wasn’t known to many others, and I couldn’t understand how a band of outlaws that big could have approached the herd without Don Enrique’s men noticing.
Chavez always made a point of making sure the night rider stayed awake in order to prevent something like this from happening. I wondered what had happened to that rider.
It wasn’t long before I noticed a clump of scrub brush that didn’t match its surroundings. Although most of the dead horses and goats were scattered at the other end of camp, the buzzards seemed to be paying an unusual amount of attention to that same patch of scrub. As I neared it, the smell was so bad I knew right off that I’d found the missing sentry.
I pulled my bandanna up over my face, and then kicked the bushes back. The flies were so thick I had to back off and grab a hunk of brush to shoo them away. I found what I’d expected but it was of little comfort. One of the mejicanos lay curled on the ground with another dead body alongside. The vaquero had part of his head crushed in, probably by a rifle stock, and it took me a moment or so before I realized it was Gregorio.
I couldn’t recognize the other. He was obviously an American, but no one I’d ever met. From what I could tell, Gregorio had been jumped while riding the herd, and had been knocked from his horse. They must have tried to knife Gregorio, instead of shooting him, so as not to alert the rest. Taking on a vaquero with a knife is never a good idea, however, even by surprise at night, and Gregorio had very good reflexes.
The cowboy laying there had a six-inch blade sticking out of his chest and an empty sheath on his belt, so it figured that, when they had struggled, Gregorio must have disarmed his attacker and then turned his own knife back on him. Although this one got what he deserved, another of the bastards must have clubbed Gregorio from behind.
I rolled the dead outlaw over and searched him for identification, for some clue as to whom he was or whom he rode with. Unfortunately there was nothing in his pockets except an old tobacco pouch, a bent hoof pick, and a poker chip from a place called the Golden Goose Saloon, in Gila City. Not much to go on.
Without giving it much thought, I pocketed the poker chip and rolled the outlaw out of the way. Others might be more charitable about such things, but I wasn’t about to waste my efforts burying him. Gregorio, however, was my friend and deserved better, as does any good man who goes down fighting. I wanted to bury him alongside of Joaquin, but, given the condition the body was in, it would have been hard to carry him by hand, so I went back to camp in search of a blanket.
I returned to cover the vaquero and then, using a plank torn off of Chango’s wagon, dragged his remains back to the campsite and began to dig a grave. I managed to rummage up a shovel out from under the wreckage. It was burned but still intact, and served its purpose.
The ground wasn’t especially hard, but the work was. I knew it wasn’t my fault, but guilt has a funny way of creeping into one’s bones. I was the scout for the outfit. It had been my job to pick a safe route, avoid trouble, and get the herd through intact. I had argued for the change of direction, chosen the campsite, and now my recommendations had led to all this. Good men were dead, others injured, and the lives of two good families were faced with ruin, all because they had trusted me.
Logic told me that I wasn’t responsible for the crimes of a band of renegades, but I still couldn’t shake the feeling that I was somehow to blame. The more I dug, the harder the ground seemed. I was tired of burying friends and family.
Chapter Nine
Standing over Gregorio’s grave with shovel in hand started me wondering if someone would be as kind to me when my time came, and, judging by what I’d been through, there was a distinct possibility that could be sooner rather than later. Just as that thought crossed my mind, a rustling sound erupted from the bushes nearby, and a branch snapped. My right hand dropped to my side, but before my Colt broke leather, Bruto, one of Chango Lopez’s two mules, walked through the thicket and out into the open.
I was so relieved when he approached, I actually laughed aloud.
“You purt’ near scared the daylights out of me, old fellow,” I said, rubbing his forehead. “How in blazes did you manage to get away?”
His harness and bridle were still in place, with the reins trailing on the ground behind. I replaced them up over his back, so he wouldn’t step on them, and quickly checked him over. There were a few minor cuts and scratches but fortunately nothing major. Bruto was snorting anxiously, so I stroked his mane, trying to calm the both of us down.
Even though cowboys work mostly range-crossed grade horses, every rider I’d ever met had a strong opinion about what they considered the best breed of horse. Cowboys will spend hours around a campfire arguing the merits of the wild mustang over the thoroughbred, or comparing Arabs to Appaloosas. While vaqueros are basically no different, Chango Lopez was especially particular about his choice. He rode mules.
In actual fact, Chango rode what had to be the biggest brace of jack mules in the Southwest. I’d seen large mules before when I hauled supplies to outposts in the Kansas Territory for Russell, Majors, and Waddell, but nothing like the pair Chango used. On a bet Rogelio once measured their front hoofs. They turned out to be twice as big across as those of the biggest gelding in the remuda.