Río Chama, page 16
After holstering the .44, Wade wiped his hands on his trousers, let his heartbeat slow again. He had hoped to rest here, ride on toward Parkview in the morning, but now? Now he was, like Randy had just said, way too jumpy, and whoever had lighted the candles on the wall would return.
“We’d best head out,” he said, not bothering to answer Randy’s fool question.
No one, not even Randy, seemed to dally.
They made a beeline for the door, Jeremiah Cole in the front, Randy bringing up the rear, watching in horror as the door jerked open to reveal a tall man’s silhouette.
Chapter Twenty
“What is the meaning of this? Have you no decency? How dare you enter this sacred place with those instruments of Satan.” A long, crooked finger pointed at the Merwin & Hulbert in Britton Wade’s hand.
Expecting the man in the doorway to be one of Senator Cole’s riders, they had reacted quickly, Wade grabbing Jeremiah Cole’s prison shirt, jerking him back, jamming the .44’s barrel underneath the kid’s chin. Paden had stepped in front of Fenella, aiming the Marlin, and Randy had dived to the floor, bringing up the shotgun.
Yet no one fired. The man in the doorway raised his voice. “I command you to leave here at once!”
He spoke with a French accent. A silver cross hung from his neck. That cross had probably saved his life, kept the others from pulling the triggers.
“We meant no offense, Father.” Wade lowered the hammer, and holstered the revolver.
“You do not offend me. You offend Him!”
A tall, sloop-shouldered man with a long face, maybe forty, with piercing hazel eyes, and a nose that had been broken more than once. More pugilist than priest, he looked like he would fight the men before letting them out of the crumbling morada, but he stepped aside as Wade led the group into sunlight.
“We’ll water our horses before taking our leave,” Wade said. It wasn’t a request.
The priest said nothing until Randy began hauling water from the well.
“You are the riders of judgment.” He had walked from the church toward them.
Paden looked up. “How’s that?”
“It is what the people of Los Pinos say.” The priest waved toward Cole. “You bring him to Tierra Amarilla, to stand before the Almighty. He is Jeremiah Cole.” Staring at the cottonwood.
“Judgment riders?” Paden took off his Governor’s hat to scratch his head. “I mean riders of judgment. You’ll have to spell that out to me. We ain’t exactly been reading newspapers of late. Been a mite busy.”
Turning away from the tree, the priest slowly exhaled. “At first, my flock did not know what all of this meant, but the news has traveled across New Mexico. How you have taken him”—he gestured at Cole—“from the so-called law to bring him to the gallows.” He swallowed. “At first, many said you rode for Senator Cole, that you would have this lad cheat death, cheat the law, but now it is believed that you ride for the Mexican people.” His eyes fastened on Britton Wade. “But I know better.”
Wade stared him down. “Believe what you want.” He pulled so hard on the saddle’s cinch that the buckskin snorted.
“As may you,” the priest continued, nonplussed. “You may believe this, too, or no. Yesterday, a great scout came to El Aserradero Pequeño de Los Pinos, and visited here, with many, many riders, including Senator Cole.” He had Jeremiah’s interest. Had all of them, like trouts on hooks. “The great scout was forced to ride in a buckboard, with crutches, one of his legs being broken. He said you would be coming this way. He said he would find you.”
Wade glanced at Paden.
“I told you we should have buried Zech Stone while we had our chance back at The Wall of Many Voices,” Paden said.
Wade looked back at the priest.
“That is when my flock began to have hope that you would do what is right. That is when they began to call you the riders of judgment.”
“But you think different,” Paden said as he shoved the Marlin into its scabbard.
“I believe in the wrath of God, as well as his love, but I see too often the wrath of man. Does this boy deserve to die?”
“Father!” Fenella stepped away from her dun, her face bewildered. “You?” She pointed to the cottonwood. “This was my church, for a while. Father Vasco was my priest. He . . .”
“Was an evil man.” The priest crossed himself, bowing his head.
No one spoke. The sorrel stamped its hoof.
The priest lifted his head, tears welling in those once hard hazel eyes, looked right at Jeremiah Cole, and said something in French. He blinked away the tears. “Tell them, my son.”
“I ain’t telling nothing!”
“You cannot expect God’s forgiveness if you do not confess all,” the priest said. “Jesus in heaven knows why you did what you did.” He had turned to the others, pleading. “Hear me, I do not say the boy should not answer for his crime. It was wrong for him to take Juan Vasco’s life. Perhaps, he should hang . . . I do not know. How can we know? We are not God. We are humble, foolish men in a brutal wilderness. I have not been at Los Pinos for very long, but I know the truth. This boy knows the truth. If you would hear . . .”
“Shut up!” Cole had broken away, slammed his clasped hands into the priest’s temple, staggering the tall man, but not knocking him down. Randy jumped to Cole, planting the shotgun against the kid’s backbone, but Cole acted like he didn’t feel the barrels, like he didn’t care. He turned away.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, none of you know a damned thing. Y’all don’t know nothing.” He pointed at the cottonwood. “That’s the tree. I can show you the damned branch we used. Me and Tom Oliver. Matt Denton. Manuel Sanchez. Big Boy Davenport. We dragged that dirty rotten son-of-a-bitch out of that privy yonder. He had been hiding from us. Fool should have lit out for Colorado, but I would have chased that . . .” He choked out the words. “I would have followed him to hell, just to kill him.”
Silence.
Randy cleared his throat. “To prove somethin’ to your daddy?”
“My daddy?” Cole laughed a savage, hoarse cry. “Oh, that’s why them others rode with me. They weren’t riding for me, for damned sure. They thought it was something Pa wanted, and maybe he did.” He whirled toward Paden. “What was it you told me, Paden? Stand on my own two feet? Hell, that’s what I was trying to do. At least I thought I was. That son-of-a-bitch Vasco wouldn’t bury my brother. Wouldn’t bury my mother. Said they didn’t belong in consecrated ground.”
“Because they killed ’emselves?” Paden asked, uncertain.
Cole laughed.
“That is no reason to kill a priest!” Fenella yelled.
“That ain’t why I killed him!” He shook his head again, pulled at his tangled hair. Tears streamed down his face. “You ask my father, you ask anyone around here who ain’t Mexican, who wasn’t riled over Pa taking the Tierra Amarilla Land Grant from them, and they’ll tell you . . . they’ll swear on a stack of Bibles . . . that my mother died of cholera. That’s what Senator Roman Cole says. Said it so much that he even believes it, but it ain’t true. Not one word of it.
“Pa come here, greedy as anything ever sired. Wanted this land. The mill just north of here belonged to my mother’s grandfather. That’s right. I’m half Mexican, but, God forbid, don’t you ever tell Roman Cole that. He’d shove those words down your throat, break your neck. He said . . .” He sobbed harder. Stumbled to his knees, head bent down, hands on the dirt, trembling, holding himself up. “Pa thought it would be good to have a Mexican wife for what he was doing. Stealing the land. My grandparents’ land. Apache land. The whole damned land grant. And when my mother found out why he had married her, what all he had done, when Father Vasco yelled her name in Mass, threw her out of this church . . .” He pushed himself back onto his feet, staggering backward, blindly.
“Excommunicated her,” the priest said.
“Branded her is what he done!” Cole stared at the cottonwood. “Shamed her. Ruined her. He drove her to the barn. He put that rope around her neck. He pushed her from the loft. He . . .”
He seemed to be in control now, no longer crying, wetting his lips, almost smiling. “Vasco wasn’t there, mind you. He was here. But he killed my mother. But, God forbid, a Catholic can’t kill herself! But a priest can, can . . . Never mind. And then Vasco wouldn’t even let her be buried in her parish cemetery, alongside her parents, her people.”
“So you killed him?” Fenella seemed staggered.
“I didn’t kill him for that.” Cole let out a chuckle. “That was years ago. I was just a kid. Me and Billy . . . that’s my big brother . . . we just waited for my father to kill Vasco. To avenge our ma. But he didn’t. Ma didn’t mean a damn to him by then. He’d gotten all he needed from some Mexican girl. Gotten two sons. Gotten land. Gotten rich. Oh, but Roman Cole had a reputation to protect. Not my mother’s, but his own. He said he buried her at the home, buried her where he could talk to her when he was of a mind, buried her so his children wouldn’t have to ride all the way to Los Pinos to pay their respects. And he let it be known that she had died of cholera.”
“Father Vasco was a man of God,” Fenella said, unbelieving. “He wouldn’t . . .” She was looking at the French priest, praying for his help.
“You are a beautiful woman,” the priest said. “He would be kind to you . . . at first.”
She shook her head. “He . . .”
“He got your marriage annulled.” Cole kicked up dirt with his feet. “Hell, how much did that cost you? How long were you at Los Pinos, woman? Two months? Three? You thought you owed that lousy bastard? A man of God!” He spit out his contempt.
The priest cleared his throat. “Juan Vasco was a user.”
Fenella’s head shook harder.
“He used people. Women.” He looked down. “Boys. He let his soul become corrupted. By power and lust. By hatred. He reminds me of those who said they were men of God during the Inquisition. Those who enslaved the Indians for their own profit. The Church brings in all kinds. Some good. Most good. Most wonderful, wonderful . . .” His head shook slightly. “But . . .” He crossed himself again. “It is impolite to speak ill of the dead, to soil the reputation of a man, especially a priest. There is no need to speak of this more.”
“You started it, padre!” Cole yelled. “You all started this. Vasco drove my big brother to that same barn. And what he done to my brother was . . . Hell, never you mind that. But he put a rope around my brother’s neck. He killed Billy, just the same as he had killed our mother. But this time I was smarter. I knew Roman Cole wouldn’t lift his hand. My father wouldn’t even admit . . . after Billy hanged himself . . . wouldn’t even admit that Billy was his own flesh and blood. Just let me and some hired hands bury him. God as my witness, Pa found Billy hanging there that morning, and just saddled his horse, left the barn, left my brother in the barn. Told Archie Preston to cut him down, to bury him. So I decided. I’m the rider of judgment. I lynched that damned Vasco. I led Pa’s men here. I killed that bastard. Maybe I did it to please Pa, show him I was as big a man as he is, as hard a rock as he is. But I didn’t please him, by grab. Some woman saw me here, saw what I did, hurried over to Parkview, told Father Amado, and he tells Father Virgilio, and it’s like lightning has struck in the forest in the driest of summers. I’d figured to ride over to Las Vegas, join up, go off to free the Cubans, get away from this awful place. But it don’t go that way. I get arrested by a deputy marshal, and this whole country chooses sides again. They wait for me to die. It’s as close as they can come to killing Roman Cole.”
He moved to the horse, climbed into the saddle, and laughed again. “And you know what my father said to me? When he came to jail? To see me? He says . . . ‘Boy, you can’t do nothing right.’ Roman Cole don’t care a damn about me. So let’s ride, boys. Come on, you sons-of-bitches, you lousy whore, you riders of judgment. Let’s ride over to T.A. Let’s get this damned thing over with. Let’s fulfill that witch’s curse on the Cole family.”
It sounded like thunder. Off to the west. Wade looked up, spotted the clouds, but figured the noise must have been his imagination.
“Come.” The priest motioned for Cole. “Come with me, my son. Inside.” He pointed to the church.
“Y’all coming?” Cole kicked the horse into a trot, rode toward the trees, reined up, waiting.
Randy had already mounted, spurring his horse, holding the shotgun, catching up with their prisoner.
The priest spoke in French, pleading, but Cole turned away.
“Come on!” Randy waved the Greener over his head. “Didn’t y’all hear? Senator Cole and his men are hereabouts. Let’s get out of here, get to Parkview. Collect our reward!”
Wade grabbed the reins, heard Paden telling the redhead: “You stay here.” Heard Fenella whisper: “No, I’ve come this far. I’ll see this through.” He saw her look at the cottonwood, saw her dab her eyes with the torn hem of her blouse, saw her mount the dun.
Paden swung into the saddle. “You comin’?”
Wade nodded. “I’ll catch up,” he said, and watched Clint Paden lead the riders of judgment and their prisoner into the forest. He walked the horse toward the priest.
“I’m Britton Wade.” He held out his hand.
“I know.” The priest drew a deep breath. “I am Father Alain Girard.”
“You’re a long way from Paris.”
The priest forced a tight smile. “Denver,” he said, “by way of Colorado City.” He shrugged. “We go where we are called.”
“I understand.” Wade looked over the saddle at the forest trail, started to mount, but swallowed, and turned back to Father Girard. “I was wondering,” he began, uncertain. Scared.
He laughed.
Scared. Again.
He looked at the church, longed to go inside, but didn’t want Paden and the others to cover too much ground. He rubbed his hands on his trousers, decided he’d face this as he had done countless fights. Mano a mano, or however one wanted to put it. Out in the open. On some dusty street. His head dropped, and he heard his own quaking voice: “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been sixteen years since my last confession.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Father Juan Vasco leered at her.
Every time she closed her eyes, she saw his face. Fenella woke with a start, trying to forget those images, trying to forget her nightmares. In the early morning light, she sat up, sighing, her heart racing, throat dry.
Out of the forest, they had camped beside an abandoned log cabin, its roof caved in, on the old trail along the Río Brazos to Parkview. She knew this meadow well, had seen the decrepit cabin more times than she could count. They easily could have made it from Los Pinos to Parkview yesterday, but no one seemed in any hurry to get there. Except maybe Randy.
And Jeremiah Cole.
Apparently she was the last to wake. Hard to figure, for she doubted if she had slept more than an hour during the night, succumbing to weariness only to jump awake from another nightmare after what felt like only seconds of sleep. The men were up and about, Jeremiah sitting by the campfire, waiting for the coffee to boil, Randy over by the cabin, working to pry a cactus spine out of his middle finger, and Clint Paden staring at the Brazos. There stood Wade Britton, on the banks of the river. Waiting.
Everyone was waiting.
Fenella Magauran had never had any luck with men. Her father had spent more time in taverns than at home, finally disappearing in Durango when she wasn’t yet thirteen. A couple of men she had known hadn’t been much better, and then along came Kurt Borgos, that Norwegian lumberman who had stepped off the train in Chama, hired by Roman Cole to run the sawmill at Los Pinos. A fine man he turned out to be. She wondered where he was now. Not that she really cared.
She tried to close her eyes, only to see Juan Vasco once more.
Accept it. Vasco lied to you, like all the others. That French priest was right.
This morning, she could see Vasco for what he was. Not a priest. No, far from a man of God. She could also picture the people of Los Pinos, especially the mothers. How could she not have noticed their faces before? She had thought they had feared God. Simple people. Peasants. No, she now realized, it hadn’t been God that they feared, but Juan Vasco.
Looking at the men she had ridden with, Fenella waited.
Randy and Paden no longer believed Senator Roman Cole would pay for his son’s freedom. Jeremiah had convinced them of that much yesterday. The kid’s father didn’t care about anything, except his own reputation. Yet Father Amado and Father Virgilio were still offering $150, and wages like that meant the world to men like Randy, and Clint Paden.
The wages of fear.
The wages of sin.
Death.
She liked Clint Paden. What woman wouldn’t? So she watched, knowing it had to come to this, that Paden and Britton Wade would face off, fight for Jeremiah Cole. How did that saying go? To the winner go the spoils. She didn’t want Paden to die, but she knew that he could never take a man like Britton Wade.
He was walking away from the Brazos, and Paden rose, wetting his lips. Fenella shot a glance at Randy, but the dumb oaf, tongue sticking out, still seemed only interested in his cactus injury.
Wade walked straight to Jeremiah Cole, pulled out a folding knife, opened it, and sliced through the rawhide bonds that secured his wrists. Without a word, Wade jammed the knife’s blade into the stump, walked back toward the Brazos, not stopping till Paden, standing near the picketed horses, called out his name.
Slowly Wade turned around, let Paden approach him, took a few steps toward him. They stopped maybe a dozen paces from one another.
“You ain’t turning him loose, Brit. Not after all the trouble we went through to get him here.”
