The Devil's Waltz Read online

  The ranger company had just four folding shovels and the men, including Posey, took turns digging graves. By late afternoon, all fourteen rustlers were buried in four large graves.

  “We’ll camp here and drive the herd to Laredo in the morning,” McDonald said. “I’ll wire the authorities in Mexico and tell them where to pick up their beef.”

  Several fires were built, hot food cooked, and coffee boiled, and the company gathered around the fires to eat.

  “Marshal, that shot you made today must have been nine hundred yards,” McDonald said. “You’ve got a hell of an eye. My company sure could use you. I hope when your business is concluded you’ll come see me.”

  “I might just do that, but I’ll need to cross the river in the morning,” Posey said.

  “Scout will track the crossing point for you, Marshal,” McDonald said.

  “Obliged,” Posey said.

  “Are you a drinking man, Marshal?” McDonald asked.

  “On occasion,” Posey said.

  McDonald removed a silver flask from a pocket of his jacket and twisted off the cap. “Join me in a sip,” he said and took a swallow.

  Posey took the flask and had a sip. It was rye whiskey. He gave the flask back to McDonald and pulled out his tobacco pouch.

  “Save that,” McDonald said. “Have one of these.”

  McDonald had a silver cigar holder that held six cigars. He removed the lid and pulled out two cigars. “Come all the way from the island of Cuba south of Florida,” he said.

  Posey took the cigar. “Obliged,” he said and struck a match.

  “Hey, Scout, bring us two cups of coffee,” McDonald said.

  Scout filled two cups with coffee and brought them to McDonald. “Here you go, Captain,” he said.

  McDonald added an ounce of rye whiskey to each cup and passed one to Posey.

  “Are you a church-going man?” McDonald asked.

  “On occasion,” Posey said.

  “I’m an ordained minister myself,” McDonald said. “I hold services every Sunday at the church in Laredo. I insist all my men attend. Sometimes we have a picnic and games for the children after the service. The girls jump rope and the boys play that game where you hit a ball with a stick.”

  “Baseball,” Posey said.

  “That’s it,” McDonald said. “Mind a question? What did you do for Sherman in the war?”

  “Advanced scout, some snipering when required,” Posey said. “I once made a shot from eleven hundred yards.”

  “I’ve been a ranger since ’fifty-nine,” McDonald said. “When the war broke out, I decided my duty was more necessary in Texas, so I missed the fighting. Were you on the march to the sea?”

  “I was.”

  “I read how horrific it was,” McDonald said.

  “I don’t believe there is a word in the English language to describe the things we did on that march,” Posey said. “They called it war. We burned the entire city of Atlanta and many raped and killed women and livestock, robbed and looted, and even killed children. I don’t know what you would call it, but I’m sure of one thing: it wasn’t war, and the word ‘horrific’ falls far short in description.”

  McDonald stared at Posey.

  “I believe I’ll turn in and get an early start in the morning,” Posey said.

  After breakfast, Posey and McDonald shook hands.

  “Marshal, it’s been a pleasure riding with you,” McDonald said.

  “Same here,” Posey said.

  “Hope to see you again,” McDonald said. “Scout, see if you can find that crossing for the marshal.”

  Posey and Scout watched the company of rangers mount up and slowly drive the herd of stolen cattle to Laredo.

  “Well,” Scout said. “Let’s see if we can find that river crossing.”

  By noon, Scout had tracked the path of the herd close to the Rio Grande River.

  “The tracks turn southwest a bit here,” he said. “Let’s give the horses an hour’s rest. I’ll make a fire and boil us some coffee.”

  Once the coffee was ready, Posey brought out a one-pound loaf of cornbread, broke off a hunk, and gave it to Scout.

  “I do love cornbread,” Scout said as he dunked it in his cup.

  “How far across the river is Nuevo?” Posey asked.

  “Depends where you cross,” Scout said. “I’ll be able to tell when we find the spot.”

  “Here,” Scout said. “They crossed here.”

  Posey and Scout dismounted and inspected the site where the cattle had crossed.

  “The silt is up right now,” Scout said. “Makes for easy crossing. Can’t be more than a few hundred yards.”

  “Nuevo?” Posey asked.

  Scout pointed southeast. “Fifteen mile that way.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Wait,” Scout said. “Captain asked me to give you this.”

  Scout dug a silver pocket watch and chain from a pocket and held it out to Posey. The badge of the Texas Rangers was embossed on the watch cover.

  “He noticed you didn’t have a watch,” Scout said.

  “I . . . lost it on the trail somewhere,” Posey said as he took the watch.

  “Best of luck to you,” Scout said and mounted his horse.

  Posey watched Scout ride away and when he was in the distance, he rolled a cigarette and found a rock to sit on and smoke it.

  He looked at the watch. It was made of pure silver, and the badge of the Texas Rangers was embossed on the cover plate. Even the chain was pure silver. He pressed the winder button and the cover plate opened. The face of the watch showed the badge of the Rangers painted on a white background with an hour, minute, and second hand in black.

  It must have cost fifty dollars or more to make such a timepiece.

  Posey closed the faceplate, attached the chain to his belt, and stuck the watch into his right front pocket.

  He looked across the Rio Grande at Old Mexico.

  “Damn,” he said aloud and then went to his horse and mounted the saddle. “Let’s get our feet wet.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  * * *

  After crossing the Grande, Posey rode southeast for a dozen or so easy miles. By his new pocket watch, the time was a few minutes before the hour of two. He stopped for a bit to give the horse a rest and to eat some cornbread.

  The Mexican sun was hot, and the back of his shirt stuck to his skin. He drank some water from his canteen and then poured a little over his hair and face.

  Before mounting the saddle, he checked the placement of the sun for direction and then kept on a southeastern path.

  The Mexican scenery wasn’t much different from that of Texas. If not for the Rio Grande dividing the two countries, the land was one and the same.

  After a few more miles, Posey rode right into a cornfield. Acres and acres of cornstalks, six feet high. He dismounted and inspected the corn. It was close to harvest. He was about to mount up when the screams of a woman shattered the silence of the cornfield.

  The woman was screaming in Spanish.

  Posey left the horse and followed the sounds of her screams. As he neared the source, he drew the Colt and cocked it.

  The screams silenced.

  Loud rustling in the cornfield caught his attention and Posey followed the sound.

  At the edge of the field, four horses grazed on tall grass. Cornstalks rustled loudly. A man’s voice said, “Hold her still, damn you.”

  Another man said, “What about us?”

  “You’ll all get a turn, now hold her still, damn you.”

  Posey turned at the edge of the field.

  Two men stood with their backs to him. Another man knelt in front of a naked woman. A fourth man held the woman’s arms stretched out over her head.

  The man holding the woman’s arms said, “She’s a hellcat, this one. I see what Tom likes about her.”

  The man kneeling opened his pants. “Never mind Tom and hold her steady,” he said and punched t
he woman in the face.

  The man holding the woman’s arms noticed Posey, released her arms, and stood up. “Company,” he said.

  The two men with their backs to Posey spun around and reached for their guns and Posey shot them in the chest.

  The man kneeling in front of the woman turned, and Posey shot him once in the chest and a second time in the face.

  Posey looked at the remaining man.

  “You going to just look at me or skin that smoke wagon?” Posey said quietly as he holstered the Colt.

  The man’s eyes told Posey he was scared to death.

  “Make your move, boy,” Posey said. “I saw what you can do against a woman. Let’s see what you can do against someone a little bigger.”

  The man stood motionless.

  “No?” Posey said. “Maybe you’d like it if I was naked and tied down?”

  The man reached for his gun and before he even touched it, Posey shot him twice.

  The first two men weren’t dead. Posey opened the loading gate of the Colt, removed the six spent cartridges, and reloaded. Then he stood over the two men still drawing breath and ended their breathing with two well-placed shots.

  Posey holstered the Colt and went to the woman. She was unconscious. She was Mexican and beautiful to look at, for sure. The right side of her face was red and swollen from the punch, and blood leaked from her nose and lip.

  Her clothes were ripped to shreds and useless.

  Posey lifted her in his arms and carried her to his horse. He set her down gently, removed the blanket from his bedroll, wrapped her in it, and then placed her in the saddle. He mounted the saddle behind her and gave the reins a soft tug.

  Nuevo wasn’t much of a town to look at. Some adobe buildings, a church, a round fountain filled with water and topped with the statue of the Virgin Mary, and a small mill powered by a donkey.

  Farmers and their women came out of hiding when Posey rode into the town square with the woman on his horse. He stopped at the fountain.

  “Does anybody speak English?” Posey said.

  A farmer dressed in typical Mexican work clothes stepped forward. “Sí,” he said.

  “Sí is Spanish,” Posey said.

  “Yes, I speak English,” the man said.

  “This woman is hurt,” Posey said and dismounted and took the woman in his arms.

  “Bring her into the church,” the man said.

  Posey smoked a cigarette as he sat on the stone fountain. It was filled with water, and he dipped his bandanna in it and wiped his face.

  Some men and women watched him from a distance.

  The man who spoke English came out of the church and walked to him.

  “She isn’t hurt badly,” he said. “What happened to her clothes?”

  “Four men tried to rape her in your cornfield,” Posey said.

  The man nodded. “Tom Spooner’s men,” he said. “Spooner will kill them for that.”

  “I already did it for him,” Posey said.

  The man looked at Posey’s badge. “You are from America?”

  “What’s your name?” Posey asked.

  “Joseph.”

  “Well, Joseph, how did you know those were Spooner’s men?”

  “He sends men sometimes when he needs a place to hide,” Joseph said. “He must be planning another robbery close to the border.”

  “And they were here, the men I killed?”

  “Yes. This morning. They took some supplies and rode out.”

  “Most of your people live on farms?”

  “All around us,” Joseph said.

  “That woman live on a farm?”

  “It was probably her cornfield you found her in.”

  “So they rode to her farmhouse and took her,” Posey said. “Does she live alone?”

  “With her father and two younger brothers,” Joseph said. “I sent someone to fetch them. Their farm is several miles from here. They have mules but no horses.”

  Posey looked at the adobe church.

  “Where’s your padre?”

  “He . . . got in the way of Spooner,” Joseph said. “He is buried behind the church.”

  Posey tossed his cigarette into the dirt. “I came here looking for Pilar Lobos,” he said. “Do you know where I can find her?”

  “You can find her in the church wrapped in your blanket,” Joseph said.

  Posey stood up and Joseph said, “The women won’t allow you in until they’ve attended to her,” he said.

  An old man suddenly came rushing past and ran to the church.

  “Her father,” Joseph said. “There is nothing you can do at the moment. Come into the cantina and have something to eat and drink.”

  The interior of the cantina was lit by dozens of candles placed on tables. Joseph sat with Posey at a table by a window. Several men were gathered at tables, and they spoke in hushed tones.

  Posey was served a plate of rice and beans with shredded beef, flat bread, and tequila.

  “Have you had tequila before, Marshal?” Joseph asked.

  “Can’t say as I have,” Posey said.

  “I don’t think you can find it in the states,” Joseph said. “It is made from the agave plant, but you must sip it slowly.”

  Posey took a small sip. “Not unlike mezcal, but smoother and sweeter,” he said.

  “Why are you looking for Pilar?” Joseph asked.

  “I’m hunting Spooner and his gang,” Posey said. “Talk is Spooner is sweet on her. I want to talk to her, is all.”

  “Go ahead,” Joseph said and looked at the door.

  Wearing men’s pants, shirt, and slippers of some kind, Pilar stood in the doorway and searched for Posey. The right side of her face was still swollen and bruised, as was her upper lip.

  She spotted him at the table and walked to him.

  “You are the American marshal that saved me?” she said. She had a slight accent, but her English was close to perfect.

  Posey nodded.

  “Joseph, leave us,” Pilar said.

  Joseph stood up and walked to a table where some men were drinking.

  Pilar grabbed a shot glass from another table, filled it with tequila, and downed it in one quick gulp.

  Then she sat. “I am Pilar Lobos,” she said.

  “I know.”

  “How did you happen by my cornfield?” she asked as she refilled her glass with tequila.

  “I’m tracking Tom Spooner,” Posey said. “I heard you know him.”

  “Yes, I know him,” Pilar said.

  “What can you tell me about him?”

  “I can tell you he is a filthy pig of a man who should be hung by the neck until dead,” Pilar said.

  “Besides that.”

  “Did you kill the men who attacked me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good.”

  “How did they happen to grab you?”

  “They came to town yesterday and stayed overnight,” Pilar said. “Spooner must be planning a robbery near the border. He comes here to hide from the law if he’s close to the border. Those men must have been his scouts timing the ride across the border. When they don’t return, he will send more.”

  “And they grabbed you on the way out?”

  “I was inspecting the corn,” Pilar said. “They rode by, and you know the rest.”

  Posey nodded. He looked across the cantina at Joseph. “Joseph, a moment,” he said.

  Joseph came to the table.

  “Take as many men as you can gather and shovels and go bury those men,” Posey said. “Bury them with their saddles and weapons. If they have money, keep it. Set the horses free, but take them off a good distance before you do that. Go now, quickly.”

  Joseph nodded. “Right away, Marshal.”

  After Joseph left the cantina, Pilar said, “The people here could use those horses.”

  “And when Spooner sends more men and they see those horses but not the men, they will most likely burn your town down and kill inno
cent people,” Posey said.

  Pilar nodded. “Yes, of course.”

  “I’d like to know everything you . . .” Posey said.

  Pilar’s father entered the cantina and spoke angrily at Pilar in Spanish. Pilar responded in Spanish and stood up.

  “My father wants me to go home and rest,” Pilar said. “We have supper at eight o’clock. I would like you to join us. We can talk more about Tom Spooner then. Ride two miles to the east and past my cornfield by about a mile.”

  Posey nodded. “All right.”

  After Pilar and her father left the cantina, Posey went outside where Joseph had gathered eight men. Each man had a shovel. Posey went to his horse and removed the folding shovel from his gear.

  “I’ll go with you,” Posey told Joseph.

  Posey chose a site on the north side of the cornfield where the graves wouldn’t be seen by riders passing by. He and the men dug two very deep graves and buried Spooner’s men with their saddles.

  Before burying them, Posey went through their pockets and saddlebags and collected one hundred and forty dollars in gold coins and folding money and gave it to Joseph.

  It was late afternoon by the time the chore was done.

  “Joseph, take the reins of a horse and have two of your men do the same,” Posey said. “We’ll walk the horses a piece and release them.”

  They walked about a mile north to a field of open grass and Posey removed the bit and reins from the four horses and tossed them away.

  “They’ll be fine,” Posey said. “Send your men ahead, and let’s you and me have a talk.”

  Joseph spoke to his men in Spanish and they set off on foot.

  Posey and Joseph sat in the shade of a tree and Posey rolled a cigarette.

  “When Spooner and his bunch ride in, why doesn’t someone send for the law?” Posey asked.

  “We never know when he is going to show up,” Joseph said. “And the nearest federal police is forty miles to the south, and we have no horses. Even if we did have one, Spooner would kill the man riding it and probably the horse, too.”

  “I understand,” Posey said. “Tell me what you can about Spooner.”

  “He is a big man like you,” Joseph said. “And has no regard for life. If we don’t obey him when he is here, he will destroy our village and burn the crops. So we do as he says until he leaves.”