Ride Proud, Rebel Part 24

"You fixin' on havin' a showdown with the captain, Hatch?" he asked.

The big man laughed. "I has me a showdown with anyone what gits too big for his breeches, Jas'. You, Reb--" he indicated Drew, with a thumb poking through a ragged glove--"supposin' you jus' show us what you got in them pockets o' yourn."

Jas' laughed. "Don't figure to find anything worth takin' on a Reb do you, Hatch? Most of 'em are poorer'n dirt."

"Now that's whar you figger wrong, Jas'." Hatch shook his head as might one deploring the stupidity of the young. "Lotsa them little Reb boys has got somethin' salted 'way, a nice watch maybe, or a ring or such.

Them what comes from th' big houses kinda hold on to things from home.

What you got, Reb?"

"A gun--in your back!"

Jas' spun in a half crouch, his rifle coming up. There was the explosion of a shot, making a deafening clap of thunder in the room. The younger bushwhacker cried out. His rifle lay on the floor, and he was holding a b.l.o.o.d.y hand. Kirby stood in the doorway, a Colt in each hand. And now Drew produced his own hidden weapon, centering it on Hatch.

The door burst open for the second time as Simmy was propelled through it, his hands shoulder high, palm out, and empty. Weatherby came behind him, a gun belt slung over one shoulder, two extra revolvers thrust into his own belt.

"They got Petey," Simmy gabbled. "Got him wi' a knife!" His forward rush brought him against the wall, and he made no move to turn around to face them. He could only plaster his body tight to that surface as if he longed to be able to ooze out into safety through one of its many cracks.

"Shuck th' hardware!" Kirby ordered.

Hatch's grin was gone. The fingers of his big hands were twitching, and the twist of his mouth was murderous.

"Lissen--" the Texan's tone was frosty--"I've a finger what cramps on m'

trigger when I git riled, an' I'm gittin' riled now. You loose off that theah fightin' iron, an' do it quick!"

Hatch's hand went to his gun. He jerked it from the holster and slung it across the floor.

"Now th' one you got holdin' up your belly ... an' your knife!"

The Colt that Hatch had taken from Drew and a bowie with a long blade joined the armament already on the boards. Drew made a fast harvest of all the weapons.

"Well, we sure got us some bounty hunter's bag," Kirby observed as he and Weatherby finished using the captives' own belts to pinion them.

"There may be more comin'; they talked about some captain." Drew brought Boyd back to the warmth of the fire.

Weatherby nodded. "I'll scout." He disappeared out the door.

Jas' was rocking back and forth, holding on one knee the injured hand Kirby had roughly bandaged; his other arm was fastened behind him. There were tears of pain on his cheeks, but after his first outcry he had not uttered a sound. Hatch, on the other hand, had been so foul-mouthed that Kirby had torn off a length of the bed covering and gagged him.

Simmy sat now with his back against the wall, watching their every move.

Of the three, he seemed the likeliest to talk. Kirby appeared to share in Drew's thoughts on that subject, for now he bore down on the small man.

"You expectin' some friends?" Compared to his tone of moments earlier, the Texan's voice was now mildly friendly. "We'd like to know, seein' as how we're thinkin' some hospitable thoughts 'bout entertainin' them proper."

Simmy stared up at him, bewildered. Kirby shook his head, his expression one of a man dealing with a stubbornly stupid child.

"Lissen, hombre, me--I'm from West Texas, an' that theah's Comanche country, leastwise it was Comanche country 'fore we Tejanos moved in.

Now Comanches, they're an unfriendly people, 'bout the unfriendliest Injuns, 'cept 'Paches, a man can meet up with. An' they have them some neat little ways of makin' a man talk, or rather yell, his lungs out. It ain't too hard to learn them tricks, not for a bright boy like me, it ain't. You able to understand that?"

Kirby did not scowl, he did not even touch the little man. But as one drawling word was joined to the next, Simmy held his body tighter against the wall, as if to escape by pus.h.i.+ng.

"I ain't done nothin'!" he cried.

"That's what I said, little man. You ain't done nothin'. But you're goin' to do somethin'--talk!"

Simmy's pale tongue swept across working lips. "What ... you want--wantta ... know?" he stuttered.

"You expectin' to meet some friends heah?"

"Th' rest o' the boys an' th' cap'n; they may be ketchin' up."

"How many 'boys'?"

Simmy's tongue tripped again. He swallowed. Drew thought he was trying to produce a crumb of defiance. Kirby reached out, selecting Hatch's bowie knife from the cache of captured weapons. He weighed it across the palm of his hand as if trying its balance and then, with deceptive ease, flipped it. The point thudded into the wall scant inches away from Simmy's right ear, and the little man's head bobbed down so that his nose hit one of his hunched-up knees.

"How many 'boys'?" Kirby repeated.

"Depends...."

"On what?"

"On how good th' raidin' is. After a fight thar's always some pickin's."

Drew was suddenly sick. What Simmy hinted at was the vulture work among the dead and the wounded too enfeebled to protect themselves from being plundered. He saw Kirby's lips set into a thin line.

"Kinda throw a wide rope, don't you, little man? How many 'boys'?"

"Maybe five ... six...."

"An' this heah cap'n?"

"He tells us wheah thar's good pickin's." For a moment the man produced a spark of spite. "He's a Reb, like you----"

"Have you used this place before?" Drew broke in. If this were either a regular or temporary rendezvous for this jackal pack, the quicker they were away, the better.

"No, the cap'n said to meet here tonight."

"I don't suppose he said _when_?" Kirby's question was answered by a shake of Simmy's unkempt head.

Boyd suddenly moved in his coc.o.o.n of blankets, struggling to sit up, and Drew went to him.

He was coughing again with a strangling fight for breath which was frightening to watch. Drew steadied him until the attack was over and he lay in the other's arms, gasping. The liquid in the pot on the fire was cooked by now. Perhaps if Boyd had some of that in him.... But dared they stay here?

Kirby squatted back on his heels as Drew settled Boyd on his blankets and went to unhook the pot. Then the Texan supported the younger boy as Drew ladled spoonfuls of the improvised broth into his mouth.

"Th' doc'll come," Kirby murmured. "Croff promised to guide him heah.

But this gang business--"

"I don't see how we can move him now...." Drew was feeding the broth between Boyd's lips, trying to ease the cough, his wits too dulled to tackle any problem beyond that.