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  “Fargo, I been thinking—”

  “There you go, exaggerating again.”

  Booger gave him the evil eye. “I see you’ve tired of eating solid food. Anyhow, it makes no sense, Catfish. The Espanish are well settled in New Orleans. Why would this here viceroy just pull up stakes and head for the Bear Flag Republic? The garlics ain’t so welcome there since the Mex’can War.”

  “He told me in his dispatch that his doctors ordered it—something about the ‘noxious miasma’ in New Orleans being bad for his lungs.”

  “Aye, it is a foul, stinking place. But a man need not cut his arm off at the elbow just to cure a hangnail, hey? He could move upriver to Memphis and not have to face the painted savages of Texas and New Mexico Territory—nor the Mex’can freebooters.”

  Fargo shrugged. “Each man to his own gait. Oglethorpe says the viceroy has been at loose ends since his wife was killed by yellow fever. Sometimes a man just wants to get as far away as he can from bad memories.”

  Booger made a farting noise with his lips. “Yes, by watching his daughter get raped by twenty Kiowa bucks before they raise her hair? Ain’t he the sensitive son of a bitch! To old Booger, it don’t quite cipher.”

  “It does seem a mite queer,” Fargo admitted. “Then again, he’s got us on the payroll, two men with brass onions, to get him through. And there’s other armed men with him.”

  Fargo heaved a sigh of relief when they finally broke free of the dense tree cover without further incident and rode out onto the broad, grassy expanse west of Matagorda Bay. Powder-horn, an outfitting camp for the less traveled southern route to the west, known as the Southwest Trail, lay below the low ridge they were following, a sprawl of tents, dugouts, livestock corrals, mercantiles, saloons, and a large wagon yard with a smithy.

  “Damn your bones, Fargo,” Booger groused, casting a wistful eye toward the settlement. “Just a brief stop to dip our beaks?”

  “Nix on that. That pitfall was our warning. Once you get a snoot full of who-shot-John in you, you’ll seek out the comfort of a soiled dove. And the best time to kill a man is when he’s taking a crap or in the heat of the rut. The Quintana party is just a mile past Powder-horn, so let’s make our report.”

  “Satan’s pushing me from behind, Fargo! Take pity on old Booger.”

  “Put it away from your mind for now. Remember, this is not the Oregon Trail—there will be good stores and settlements along this route.”

  “Pah!” Booger spat a brown streamer into the grass and scowled with frustration. “Fargo, you son of a motherless goat! I oughter shoot you, take your gold, and go on a three-day carouse. You’ve turned into a bluenosed temperance biddy, Goddamn it!”

  Fargo transformed his face into a mask of piety and replied in a pulpit tone, “Now, now, brother Booger—God’s last name isn’t Damn it.”

  • • •

  Fargo found the Quintana party right where he was told they would be, but his reception turned out to be an unpleasant surprise.

  The new arrivals stopped about fifty yards out, surveying the staging area.

  Booger, a veteran knight of the ribbons who had whipped the best Concord coaches for the Overland Stage Company, loosed an appreciative whistle.

  “Christmas crackers! Wouldja glom that fancy rig I’ll be driving, Fargo! Thoroughbraces and springs! I ain’t never seen the like.”

  “It’s some pumpkins,” Fargo agreed, admiring the jet-black japanned coach shining like new tar in the coppery late-afternoon sunshine. “The outfitter must still be down there, too. Look at all the livestock and provisions.”

  Everything was in a great stirring and to-do. A temporary rope corral had been set up, crowded with horses and mules. Wooden crates of supplies were stacked everywhere among fodder wagons, high-walled freight wagons, and two “mud wagons,” light, cheap coaches without doors. What truly surprised Fargo, however, was the large number of mostly young men, most of them evidently Spanish or Mexican.

  Three of whom now rode out toward Fargo and Booger.

  “Cut off my nuts and call me Squeaky,” Booger said. “Are them bellhops?”

  “Spanish soldiers,” Fargo said, his tone wondering. “Two officers and a sergeant. This deal ain’t what I expected, old son.”

  One of the soldiers rode slightly ahead of the others on a coal black Arabian wearing a fancy, silver-trimmed saddle. The officer reined in about ten feet from the dusty, trail-worn frontiersmen. The metal facing on his tall shako hat glinted in the sun.

  “My name is Captain Diego Salazar of Seville, a sus ordenes.” He greeted Fargo with stiff formality. “You must be the scout named Fargo?”

  His dismissive tone—as if Fargo were the lowest menial—made the Trailsman immediately dislike the smug son of a bitch. Fargo took in the neat, slender, mustachioed Spaniard. He wore a well-cut frogged jacket and tight, gold-braided trousers tucked into shiny boots that almost covered his calves. His hard, tight-lipped mouth was straight as a seam.

  “Yeah, I’m Fargo,” he replied, adding in his mild way, “I’m a mite curious, Captain. What are uniformed foreign soldiers doing on sovereign American soil?”

  Salazar seemed annoyed, as if the question were im- pertinent.

  “We are retained by His Excellency, don Hernando Quintana, viceroy of Monterrey. We have letters of marque from Governor Miro of Louisiana that identify us as soldiers of the Spanish Crown.”

  Fargo’s eyes shifted to the two uniformed soldiers sitting their saddles behind Salazar. The captain noticed this.

  “Lieutenant Juan Aragon,” he said curtly, “and my orderly, Sergeant Rivera.”

  Aragon had a disapproving face with dead, glass-button eyes. The sergeant was stout and brutish-looking. Neither man noticed the introduction—they were staring with a mixture of contempt and awe at Booger and Ambrose.

  “This is the driver you hired?” Salazar asked Fargo.

  “Does Raggedy Ann have a patched ass?” Booger spoke up, his moon face reddening with anger. “Booger McTeague here, a true-blue, blown-in-the-bottle, man-eating—”

  “Caulk up, knothead,” Fargo cut in. He didn’t like this arrogant trio, either, but he was diplomatic when large sums of money were in the mix.

  Booger’s Irish temper, however, made him quick to rile and slow to cool off.

  “Seems to me,” he told Fargo, “like these three sons of de Soto are surprised to see you above the horizon, Skye, y’unnerstan’? Like just maybe they was expecting you to have a little accident back along the trail.”

  “These norteamericanos,” Lieutenant Aragon spoke up, “need to be taught a lesson about respect for their betters, verdad, Capitan? Most especially el gordo here, who is an ass riding on an ox.”

  “Why, you greaser pipsqueak! You’re plucking the wrong bird, soldier. Fargo, I don’t palaver the lingo too good—the hell’s a gordo?”

  Both of the officers wore what Fargo sarcastically called cheese knives—gold-hilt sabers, the blades thirty-three inches of deadly Toledo steel. They were virtually worthless on the frontier, where a weapon like the Arkansas toothpick in Fargo’s boot sheath could kill much quicker. But the Volcanic repeating sidearms in their flap holsters were not for show.

  “Simmer down,” Fargo ordered, placing a hand on Booger’s massive shoulder when he started to slide to the ground. “You started it, mouth.”

  Salazar looked at Fargo, everything in his face smiling except the eyes. “Yes, we must all ‘simmer down’ as you say. His Excellency expects all of us to work together.”

  Fargo glanced closer at Rivera, the hulking brute of a sergeant. His eyes had the burning luminosity of an insane fanatic. He wore a machete in a shoulder scabbard—definitely no cheese knife. Fargo knew that short, curved blade was capable of severing a man’s spine like a cane stalk.

  “Sounds jake to me,” Fargo finally replied. “I’
m here to do a good job and make money.”

  “Don Hernando will want to speak with you soon,” Salazar added. “But he is a—how do you say?—fastidious man with a sensitive nose. I suggest you both bathe first. You will find hot food in the camp.”

  All three men cast one last, mocking glance at the shabby giant perched on an ox, then reined their mounts around and rode back to the staging camp.

  “Come back again when you can’t stay so long, Sanchos,” Booger told their retreating backs.

  He spat into the grass and aimed a withering glance at Fargo. “‘Sounds jake to me.’ Trailsman, get to the sewing lodge. That skull-faced, cock-chafing Aragon called me a gordo! And that Salazar—why, he prac’ly lopped off your nuts!”

  “You listen to me, you big ugly ape, and you listen good. There’s a damn good chance you’re right about that pitfall, savvy?”

  Booger cocked his head, confused. “Huh? Then how’s come—”

  “Because I’m not a thick-skulled, hot-jawing fool like you, that’s why. Booger, a man has to wade in slow until he knows how deep the water is. There’s a camp full of dons down there. Sure, we could’ve blown all three of those whip dicks outta their saddles, and then you tell me—how fast could you have skedaddled on Ambrose?”

  Booger showed the first signs of contrition. “I take your drift.”

  “All right. Right now we’re the hind-tit boys. We bide our time, keep our eyes and ears open, and figure this deal out. You put a tether on that tongue.”

  They gigged their mounts into motion and headed toward the camp.

  “You know, Catfish,” Booger opined, “that Sergeant Rivera didn’t say one damn word, but I make him out the most dangersome of the three. Did you see that fucker’s crazy eyes? He’s an easy-go killer, all right.”

  “Yeah. He’s got that Latin look—pig Latin.”

  3

  Both men headed toward the makeshift corral.

  “Hey-up, boys!” a friendly voice greeted them. “The name is Bitch Creek McDade, but most folks just call me Bitch except in mixed company. I’m the wrangler for this glorious outfit.”

  At first Fargo thought a ghost might be speaking. Then he saw the speaker emerge from amid a milling tangle of mules. He was short but descended from big-boned Ulster stock, the same tough, hard-knit men who filled the ranks of America’s police forces and army barracks.

  Fargo reined in and swung down from the saddle. “Hey-up yourself. Most fellows wouldn’t take kindly to being called Bitch.”

  The sturdy redhead tossed back his head and laughed. “Yeah, but it cuts down on dustups. See, when a man’s name is Bitch, why, the insult is already built into it. No need to call him any more names. Say! That is one crackerjack stallion, friend!”

  He glanced at Booger, just then sliding to the ground, and gave him a quick size-up.

  “So I finally meet Paul Bunyan and his blue ox. Big fella, I can see why you need to straddle an ox. Say, you’re big enough to fight cougars with a shoe.”

  “I had a cougar for breakfast,” Booger boasted. “Didn’t take a shoe off, neither.”

  Fargo threw the bridle, then slipped the bit and loosed the cinch. “Bitch, meet your fellow Irishman Booger McTeague, the best damn reinsman who never rolled an Overland stage. I’m Skye Fargo.”

  “Pleased. I’ve heard about you, Mr. Fargo. My boss knows you—he’s the outfitter for this fandango. That’s him over there—the skinny, baldheaded rake counting crates.”

  Fargo glanced where McDade pointed.

  “Sure, that’s Jerome Helzer. He used to run the sutler store out at Fort Union. I see he stole enough legem pone from the army to set himself up in business.”

  McDade laughed again as he pulled Fargo’s saddle. “For a surety. He’s got money to toss at the birds now. He hired out me and Deke Lafferty, the cook, to this Quintana gent.”

  “Bitch, you don’t sound overjoyed about it,” Booger chimed in.

  McDade shrugged a shoulder. “Ah, the money’s good, I s’pose. But these Spaniards seem a might clannish. The old man, Quintana, is full of himself and talks like a book, but he seems a pretty good sort.”

  McDade glanced quickly around, then lowered his voice. “I’m clemmed, though, if I can figure out all these damned soldiers. I see you boys just met Salazar, Aragon, and that greasy-looking Rivera. Those three are the topkicks. Sweet outfit, huh?”

  “Topkicks?” Fargo repeated. “You mean there’s more soldiers?”

  “Hell yes. Those three are the only ones in uniform but most of the others”—McDade hooked a thumb toward the camp—“are soldiers in mufti, or leastways I’d wager on it. I’ve heard Salazar call some of them by their rank.”

  “Interesting,” was all Fargo said. But Booger was not so discreet.

  “Fargo, this shit’s for the birds. I don’t take kindly to a man who pisses down my back and tells me it’s raining. You told me some rich old dago toff is moving out to California for his health. Seems to me ‘His Excellency’ is sailing under false colors.”

  “No need to have a conniption,” Fargo said. “This Quintana fellow was pretty high up in the Spanish government. When the Mexican Revolution sparked up, the viceroys were hanged, shot, or managed to escape. There’s still a kill-or-capture order on them, and you know damn well the Mexicans don’t always stay on their side of the border. It’s no big mystery why he might have soldiers around him.”

  “Pah! Happens all that’s so, Catfish, why didn’t he just hie on back to Spain where he’d be safe?”

  Fargo tugged at his short chin whiskers, mulling that over.

  “That’s a tough nut to crack,” he admitted.

  “Helzer told me,” McDade chipped in, “that the viceroy married an actress from New Orleans. They had a daughter before his wife died—maybe he didn’t leave because his wife wouldn’t leave New Orleans. Speaking of his daughter . . .”

  The wrangler pointed with his chin toward a huge tent in the middle of the bustling camp. Fargo watched a striking young woman, wearing a low-cut emerald green dress with velvet-trimmed cuffs, emerge through the fly. Her jeweled tiara caught the rays of a descending sun and seemed to flash into flame.

  “Senorita Miranda Quintana,” McDade said in an almost reverent tone. “Boyos, she is some. Pretty as four aces. A reg’lar Venus de Milo. But us working stiffs have got our orders from Captain Salazar—we can’t talk to her, stand close to her, nor even make eye contact with her.”

  Booger snorted. “Well, Fargo, you’re a hound. The dago didn’t say you couldn’t lie close to her. If you don’t look at her or speak to her, p’r’aps you can still screw her, eh?”

  Fargo’s eyes lingered on her as Miranda gazed around the camp. Her gaze met his. She watched him for a few long moments before demurely covering half her face with a palmetto fan and retreating into the tent.

  McDade whistled. “I’ll be jiggered, Mr. Fargo! I think that little gal’s got a sweet tooth for you already. It’s likely she knew you were coming—everybody else did.”

  “Bless her heart,” Fargo said. “But that touching little scene just now didn’t go unnoticed. Stand by for the blast, boys. Booger, keep a stopper on your gob, hear me?”

  Captain Salazar, Lieutenant Aragon, and Sergeant Rivera were striding purposefully toward the corral. Salazar’s face was grim with disapproval.

  “Look at them talking magpies,” Booger muttered. “They’re keeping step with each other. I wunner if they all piss at the same times like cows do.”

  “Senor Fargo,” Salazar said as the trio drew near. “You will find hot water and tubs one hundred yards north of camp. I suggest you and your friend avail yourselves of them.”

  “We were planning to,” Fargo said. “But I didn’t realize it was an order.”

  “And if it were?”

  “Then you and me would have us a
little problem.”

  Sergeant Rivera spoke up for his superior. “El Capitan does not give orders to civilians. If they do not follow his . . . suggestions, it falls to me to persuade them. Entiende?”

  A hairy-knuckled hand patted the sheath of his machete.

  “Sure, I understand,” Fargo replied cheerfully. “Persuasion I don’t mind.”

  “I did not mention to you,” Salazar said, “how things are between His Excellency’s daughter and myself. You see, we have . . . an understanding. We are not yet formally engaged to be wed, but we soon will be.”

  “Congratulations,” Fargo said. “She looks like a very pretty girl.”

  Salazar’s hard seam of mouth tightened even more. “Claro. I mention this only because your reputation for—how do you say?—amorous adventures is widely known. It would be unfortunate for you if you do not . . . control your usual impulses.”

  To Fargo all of this was just chicken shit and he ignored it. Something more important was on his mind. Whether in warfare or at times like this, he followed a useful credo: Always mystify, mislead, and surprise.

  Right now he opted for surprise.

  “Tell me, Captain,” he said, “would you know anything about a pitfall somebody dug on the trail to Powder-horn?”

  Clearly Salazar had not expected such a question. “A pitfall?” he repeated, annoyed.

  “Yeah, you know . . . a hole in the ground that’s covered up so that a horse and rider fall into it? This one also had poisoned stakes in it.”

  Fargo had learned to spot a liar, even a good one. But Salazar looked genuinely puzzled. Fargo’s eyes slanted toward Aragon. The lieutenant watched him from a sullen deadpan, the dead glass-button eyes registering nothing.

  As for Rivera—that slight twitching of his lips might or might not have revealed guilt.

  “No one here has plans to kill you,” Salazar said irritably. “His Excellency sent for you to guide this expedition, and I do not impede his wishes. But, of course, your own willful, reckless behavior could endanger you. Remember what I told you.”