According to Marie, it would take them something like two or three hours to get to the Comancheros’ camp if they proceeded at a walk, each leading their horse. As agreed, it was essential for the success of their venture that they should appear without warning. The preacher cross-questioned the girl about what she knew of the place and where he would find the women and girls from the orphanage. It struck him that for a man whose avowed intent was to free his own sister, Alfonso Rodriquez y Trevisa y Gonsalez, as he styled himself, was apparently content to let Faulkner undertake all the planning and even the final execution of any plan to free the captives. Faulkner asked, ‘Tell me, Marie, are the children held in a hut or tent or anything of that nature? Or are they sleeping in the open air?’
‘They got a few wickiups and a tent or two there. The girls are all linked together by their wrists, handcuffed one to the other in a line.’
‘That any grown man could treat children so reduces any compunction I should have felt about taking decisive action. Their blood will be upon their own heads if they begin anything in the line of shooting.’
It was increasingly plain to them all that without Marie to guide them, they would have stood not the remotest chance of finding their way in the canyons of Palo Duro. The path forked, twisted and sometimes appeared to double back on itself. Marie moved swiftly, darting from place to place, even leading them into what they thought, at first, was a cave. It was only a short tunnel in the rock, though, barely ten feet high, which, after twenty feet, opened out again into an open track.
Judging by the moon, it must have lacked only an hour to midnight when Marie halted them and explained in a whisper that they were only a mile or so from the camp, which lay straight ahead. She gave it as her intention to wait where they were, look after the horses for the men and not become embroiled in any of the bloodshed and violence.
The four men walked on slowly, keeping to the shadows, until, on a rocky outcrop a hundred yards ahead of them, they saw the outline of a man sitting with what looked to be a rifle in his arms. Faulkner touched each man on the arm to signal that they should stop. He then came on at a slow stroll. The man was not the world’s best sentry, because the minister had to draw attention to his presence when he was practically on top of him. He halted and called out softly, ‘Mahrooway,’ which is as much as to say ‘Hallo,’ in Taibo.
The man on guard stood up, cocked his piece and pointed it towards Faulkner. ‘Kwai toh say amigo?’ he called. Are you a friend?
The three men behind Faulkner caught snatches of a conversation and then saw the pastor walking up to the man. For a brief moment, the two of them were silhouetted in the moonlight and then one of the figures made a rapid movement and the other fell down. The three of them sprinted forward, hoping that it was the minister who had triumphed. So it proved when they reached them, because a rough-looking man was lying on top of the rock, unconscious and breathing stertorously.
The pastor had a large rock in his hand and a regretful expression on his face. ‘Had to do it,’ he announced sorrowfully. ‘He smelled a rat and went for to fire, so I lamped him with a rock. I think he will live, but you men had better truss him up tight. A gag wouldn’t go amiss, either.’ It escaped nobody’s notice that now that the action had begun, Faulkner was speaking like a man giving orders. The elderly parson had all but melted away, leaving only a grimlooking man that none of the other three felt inclined to cross.
According to what the girl had told them, the camp itself would be another hundred yards or so ahead of them. If Faulkner was right and the men were getting liquored up in the Comanche village, then they would only have one or at the most two more men to deal with. All the men had their pistols out now, although their fervent hope was that it would not come to shooting. The sound of a gun battle erupting in the canyons would be sure to bring every Comanche, Kiowa and Comanchero for fifty miles running in their direction, an eventuality that all four hoped to avoid.
They moved on cautiously, stopping at intervals to listen. Far off in the distance was the faint sound of singing and occasional shouts. It was difficult to judge distances in the canyon, but to Faulkner it sounded as though the noise was coming from at least a couple of miles away. He indicated that the others should stop.
‘I will now go on ahead again by myself. I do not wish to take the chance of one of you young bucks opening fire. It would be like sticking our heads in a hornets’ nest.’ He reached under his coat and pulled out the Bowie knife. ‘I will hope to reason with anybody who I meet and if that does not serve, I shall cut his throat. I hope it won’t come to that.’
There was something extraordinarily chilling about hearing an elderly man clad in clerical black talking in this fashion. When he mentioned the possibility of cutting a man’s throat, there was not the slightest doubt in the minds of those hearing him that he meant this quite literally and that in order to rescue the children, he would be quite willing and able to kill anybody who stepped in his path.
Faulkner spoke again. ‘God willing, we shall be able to conclude this business in an hour. Tell me now, you boys, are you aiming to take this gold from the Comancheros, if you can find it, or is it really your intention just to report to the nearest lawman where it might be found? You best not fool with me now; I’m in a hurry.’
The two men shrugged. ‘Bit of both, I guess,’ said one. ‘We thought of taking some of it and then tracking them as they move it to a town.’
‘Just wait here, then, and you can do that once those girls are freed. And you, Gonsalez, you can wait here, too. If I free the children, I shall also have the two women. None of you come on until I say so.’
Faulkner moved silently along the side of the rock face, keeping the little huddle of wickiups in sight. As he got closer, he saw a flurry of movement and heard a high, childish cry of distress. He moved swiftly forward until he was in the Comanchero camp itself. As he moved round the first wickiup, Faulkner both saw what had caused the movement and understood the distressed cry he had heard. Two figures were lying in the dust, struggling. One was a grown man who was snarling and grunting with frustration as he tried to force himself on a slim girl. At first, Faulkner assumed that it was some camp follower of the Comancheros, maybe a girl like Marie from the saloon. Then the two of them rolled over and he could see that the girl was a mere child. With a dreadful shock he suddenly realized what he was witnessing; the attempted violation of one of the children from the Oneida Orphans’ Asylum.
Twenty years ago, Jonas Faulkner’s temper had been legendary. Even among men who would kill somebody at the drop of a hat over some fancied slight, Faulkner was regarded with some caution. He had been known to explode in a killing rage for almost nothing, firing randomly at anybody in sight. People took good care in the old days not to piss Jonas Faulkner off.
For the first time in over fifteen years, Faulkner’s devil was loosed. He sprang at the villain, who was trying to rape the girl who could be thirteen at most, and hauled him off the child. The man’s back was to him as he whirled him round, and without pausing for a fraction of a second the preacher grabbed a hold of the man’s lank and greasy hair and jerked his head back sharply. Then he brought his Bowie knife round and slashed his throat with as much force as he could muster.
The blood shot out from the severed arteries in the man’s neck with enough force to send it spurting three foot into the air. Faulkner did his best not to get in the way of this fountain, thrusting the man from him with disgust. The child was watching the scene in terror, obviously wondering if she was about to become the next victim of this knife-wielding maniac.
The pastor sheathed his knife and squatted down next to her. ‘It’s all right, child, don’t be afeared. I’ve come to take you on to the orphans’ asylum in Claremont. Did yon ruffian . . . did he. . . ?’
‘No, sir, but it weren’t for want of trying!’
‘So I saw. Come on, there’s a good girl. I know you’ve had a shock, but we need to be moving quickly now.’
‘Is he dead?’
‘Well, I don’t think he’ll be troubling any more girls in that way in a hurry.’
At that moment, the other three men fetched up in the camp, in flat defiance of Faulkner’s clear instructions to them. The first on the scene was the nicest looking of the two boys, who almost tripped over the bloody corpse of the Comanchero. He looked down to see what had caused him to stumble and then gave a low moan when the horror of the thing struck him. The man’s head was only just hanging onto his shoulders by a thin band of flesh and skin. ‘Jesus Christ!’ he exclaimed in horror. ‘You nearly took his head off!’
‘Well, boy, I told you I would cut any man’s throat who hindered my objective. Strikes me you are a mite too squeamish for this sort of work.’ The other two men stood dumbstruck as they gazed down at the all but decapitated body. They looked from the body to the preacher and then back again. It was pretty plain that they were all three of them wondering what sort of man they had hitched up with. In the meantime, Faulkner was tenderly helping the young girl up and speaking soft and comforting words to her. He put his arm round her shoulders and, ignoring the others, began to help her in the direction of where she said her friends were being kept.
The five girls and two women were all handcuffed together and the last two in the line were each hand cuffed to the wheel of a wagon. The girl he was supporting had a handcuff dangling from her wrist and it was a fair guess that the man who had been trying to ravish her had freed her from the line. This meant that he must have a key, which would unlock the cuffs. Faulkner turned to the three men. ‘One of you run now and search that devil I killed. Bring back the key, which he must have about him.’ None of the three made any attempt to obey.
‘I ain’t going near to that thing!’ said one of the young men, and his companions evidently felt the same way.
The preacher clucked an irritable noise in his throat. ‘Landsakes, what’s wrong with you all? A dead man can’t hurt you. What is it, you all afraid of the bogeyman? Stay here, I’ll go myself.’
But Pastor Faulkner did not get the opportunity to fetch the key, because he was suddenly aware that the ground was trembling in the way it did when a troop of horses were coming along at a smart pace. By the time he had grasped the implications of this, a dozen men on horseback were thundering into the camp and had surrounded the minister and his travelling companions. Faulkner raised his hands and the others followed suit. All the riders had pistols, shotguns or rifles trained on them; it would have been suicide to set to under those circumstances.
A pleasant-looking and portly middle-aged man with immaculately trimmed mustachios dismounted and stood for a moment surveying the four of them. From a little way off came an exclamation of anger They had discovered the man that the minister had killed. The fellow who had got off his horse went to investigate, leaving the other horsemen keeping their weapons trained upon the four intruders. When he returned, this man, who seemed to be the leader of the others, said in perfect English, with only the faintest of Spanish accents, ‘Tell me, which of you killed him?’
‘I did.’
‘Remarkable. You have nearly severed his head from his body. What did you use?’
‘I will show you, but I must reach under my coat. Tell your men to be easy, I’m not going for a gun.’ The pastor brought out his Bowie knife and tossed it down in front of the mustachioed man, who picked it up and examined it carefully.
‘It is a fine weapon. Why did you kill him?’
‘He had freed this child and was trying to force himself upon her. I would kill him again if I saw such a thing. He was a beast who deserved to die.’
‘What you say is true and I would not have left him alone to guard these people, had I been here. You have saved me five hundred dollars and the trouble of killing the man myself. The value of these girls lies chiefly in their virginity. A used girl drops in price dramatically. Thank you.’
The other riders were dismounting now and were staring in no friendly fashion at the men who had crept into their camp and killed one of their number. The leader gestured to the four prisoners and said, ‘Stand over there please, in a line. I wish to know what is going on here. You are not soldiers, that is certain. You, old man, where did you learn to use a Bowie knife in that way? I know some knife-fighters, indeed I have killed many myself with a blade, but I have never yet seen anybody served so. What is your profession?’
‘I am a Presbyterian minister. I look after the church in Claremont, some miles north of here.’
‘Claremont. Ah yes, that is where those girls were headed, is it not? And you are really a priest? Yes, I see by your clothes that it could be so. And yet what a priest! I have only dealt in the past with Catholic priests and they are not like you at all. Few of them would take off a man’s head as you did. Are all Presbyterians that fierce?’
‘Happen it depends which theological college they attended.’
The Comanchero leader roared with laughter, slapping his leg with delight. He might have been a man attending a musical theatre for all the honest enjoyment the discussion of the near beheading of one of his band seemed to have given him. ‘I like you, Father. I might have to kill you shortly, but that will not lessen my liking, I do assure you.’
‘It ain’t necessary to call me “Father”. We don’t go a bunch on such goings on in our church.’
‘Forgive me. As I say, I have met few priests other than those who are Catholic. But now to business. Gentlemen, would you please step forward one at a time and lay down your weapons?’ The four men each did so. ‘And now, perhaps you could explain to me why you have invaded our privacy? I am inclined to view such trespass with extreme disfavour, especially as we are currently enjoying a period of relaxation with our friends, the Comanche. You are nothing to do with General Sheridan and yet here you are, blundering into our hideout. What is the meaning of it?’
None of the prisoners spoke. The Comanchero pulled a pistol from the holster at his hip and shot dead one of the two younger men. It was done with shocking swiftness and before the echo of the shot had died down, the boy was lying motionless on the ground.
‘Ah, you men think that because I speak pleasantly, you can ignore my questions. Not so.’ He turned to one of the riders. ‘Tico, ride over to the village and tell them not to be alarmed by the shot. Tell them that I am questioning some prisoners and that they should not be worried if they hear three more shots. Any more than that and it will mean an attack.’ The man thus addressed rode off in haste. The leader spoke once more. ‘Again, what is the meaning of this?’
The Portuguese man who had given his name as Gonsalez stepped forward a few paces. ‘Señor, I am here by arrangement. We have corresponded and you agreed to ransom my sister for two hundred and fifty dollars in gold. I have it with me.’
Pastor Faulkner could not restrain himself and burst out at this point. ‘You’re a rare scoundrel. You mean that you had agreed a ransom and then hoped to tag along with us and save yourself the cost? You crawling snake.’
The Comanchero smiled in delight. ‘Ah now, what is this? Has somebody tried to cheat me? Tell me what this means?’ Gonsalez began to stutter an excuse, but the leader of the Comancheros silenced him with an imperious gesture. ‘No, my friend, not you. Let the priest explain what has taken place. I trust him more than I do you. I think you are a man who will lie as readily as you would speak the truth. Well, sir?’ He turned to Faulkner, who gave a brief account of the Portuguese man’s actions. There were a few seconds’ silence.
‘But this is most pleasing. We had a deal and you reneged on it. No, no,’ said the Comanchero as Gonsalez tried to protest, ‘I can see the truth written on your face. Along with terrible fear. You think that I might kill you for your treachery. Not so, I am no more than a humble businessman. All the same, I think that this provides some grounds for renegotiating the terms of our agreement. Fetch the sister.’
After some discussion, the key was fetched and a young woman of about thirty was brought forward. In the meantime, two men caught hold of Gonsalez and expertly went through his pockets. There, they discovered not only a soft leather pouch containing the ransom money in gold coins, but also another couple of hundred dollars in banknotes. An elaborate gold pocket watch was also removed, along with a cigar cutter, several rings that he was wearing and even his cufflinks. These were all brought forward and handed to their leader.
‘There are, Alfonso Rodriquez y Trevisa y Gonsalez, certain penalties in business for those who fail to act in a straightforward and honourable way. In this case, that penalty is merely a financial one, in that we shall take all your belongings in addition to the ransom that we agreed. I tell you now, though, if ever you cross my path again, I shall not hesitate to shoot you down like the treacherous, mangy dog that you are. Be off with you, before I change my mind!’
The Portuguese man and his sister set off back to where Marie had been left in charge of the horses. The children and the remaining teacher had also had their handcuffs removed and were now milling about in a reasonably cheerful way. A fire had been kindled a few yards away and it was obvious that a meal was being prepared. Faulkner and the young man were uncertain what would happen to them now, but the man who was seemingly in charge of the whole camp set their minds at rest, at least for a spell, by saying agreeably, ‘It may well come to pass that I shall be forced to kill you both, just in the way of business, as you might say. There is, however, no reason why you should die hungry. Will you join us for food? You others, you little ones and you, teacher, come also near to the fire and we shall all eat.’
Once the fire was blazing merrily, the whole crowd of them sat around it. It surprised Faulkner that the children and their teacher did not seem to be in any particular fear of the men, who did not come across as an especially brutal or depraved bunch. The leader, whose name was Felix, invited the preacher to sit beside him. They ate hunks of bread and slices of meat, which were roasted in the fire. After a while, Felix said, ‘Tell me, priest, I can guess why you have come here, but what would you do if I just turned you loose now and sent you back to Claremont? No, don’t answer me. I can see in your eyes what would happen. You would go off and then come back in the middle of the night and cut off my head! Is it not so?’
Pastor Faulkner nodded his head slowly. ‘I reckon you have figured the case out about right. Tell me, are you not disgusted to be trafficking women and children in this way? Is it a worthy occupation for a man such as you?’ To Faulkner’s amazement, the bandit looked crestfallen and ashamed when he heard these words, and ducked his head. Faulkner wondered if he was blushing.
The man looked up and said in a low voice, ‘Of course you are right, but what would you do? If I do not provide my men with money and liquor, they will become discontented. The next thing to happen is that it will be said that I have become soft and before you know it there will be a knife in the dark and Raul or Enrique will be leading the group instead of me. What should I do with you?’
The preacher did not get a chance to answer, because just then there were cries of greeting as Marie came into sight, leading four horses. She was obviously well known to the men present and they competed with each other to invite her to sit next to them. She ignored the young man she had slept with earlier that very day, nodded saucily to Faulkner and then came over and kissed Felix demurely on the cheek.
Pastor Faulkner shook his head sadly, but there was an air about him of a man quietly satisfied that he has been shrewder than those around him. ‘I knew that you would play us false. I did not trust you from the first, when you so near got me shot. I feel sorry for this young man, for it strikes me that he has fallen for you, fool that he is. Were you working for these brigands the whole time?’
The girl tilted her head defiantly. ‘I must make my own way in the world, Preacher. You need not bother to judge me; you have sins enough on your head.’
‘That at least is true. Still and all, I could wish that a young person like you made more of herself than a bandit’s mistress.’
The girl turned on him savagely. ‘Bandit’s mistress, is it? What do you think I could do in the sort of nice town where you come from? I could not even get a job as a lady’s maid. I am a bastard orphan; nobody knows who my father was. I would be lucky to earn enough to eat. Here I am happy, here I am somebody. I am Marie. Sometimes I work in the saloon, other times I help out my friends here. You tend to your own affairs, Preacher.’
Felix laughed. ‘You know, Reverend, she has a point. You tell me that I am a villain for trading in young girls, but Marie was once such a one. She was an orphan, then a whore in a Mexican brothel and now . . . what are you now, my dear?’ Marie stalked off, offended, and Felix chuckled again before turning back to Faulkner. ‘What is that young companion of yours about? Hoping to steal from us or turn us into the law for money?’
‘Something of the sort. Turn him free. He is a good boy and your friend Marie deceived him.’
‘Marie! She deceives everybody, that one. I don’t know what I shall do with the pair of you. I should have shot you all earlier, but I can hardly murder you now after sitting down to eat with you.’ Faulkner said nothing and just watched the man curiously. He had known a good many villains in his day, but this one seemed to be of a different stamp from most.
‘How about this,’ said Felix, after thinking the matter over. ‘I allow you and your friend to live for the night and then work out what is to be done in the morning. I shall have to handcuff you and bind your feet, but that is, I think you will agree, a more pleasant prospect than being shot dead this minute? Most of us are bound for the Comanche village and so I shall bind you and then leave you and the other captives here under the guard of two men. Does this sound fair?’
There was little more to be said, because the alternative was, as Felix had suggested, instant death.
A brief interlude, our hero will prevail…