Elmore Leonard - Gunsights

Had Bren Early counted on that many opposing them? Not by half, Maurice recalled. Perhaps forty men at the most.

But one hundred-all hard-eyed cutthroats in a variety of getups: derbies, straws, sombreros, dusty business suits and batwing chaps…shotguns, rifles, six-shooters, all were armed with at least two guns; they stood about talking, drinking whiskey, checking and fooling with their weapons…talking in loud, confident voices and finding, it seemed, a great deal to laugh about.

My God.

C.S. Fly was not present. Maurice learned the famed photographer had declined the invitation, saying he had pictures enough for a fools' gallery as is. However there were others-among them A. Frank Randall of Willcox and someone representing Beuhman & Hartwell of Tucson-busy taking pictures of Sundeen, groups of his cutthroats holding rifles and revolvers, and some of the White Tanks reservation Indians who posed, not having any idea what was going on.

Maurice had to push through a crowd on the porch of the agency office to get to Sundeen inside, sitting with his boots propped up on Moon's desk and telling the news reporters his riders would “bite shallow” else they would eat those people up in two minutes. Maurice waited for Sundeen to notice him, then said, “They're ready for you.”

Sundeen eyed him. “How many people's he got?”

“I'm not at liberty to say.”

“At liberty,” Sundeen said, drawing up out of the swivel chair. “You little squirt, I'll free your soul for you.”

“About twenty,” Maurice said.

He turned and walked out. Should he have told?

Did he have a choice?

The least he could do was ride back up there and tell how many Sundeen had. God-and watch their faces drop.

The photographer from Beuhman & Hartwell caught him outside on the steps and said, “If you're going back up, I'm going with you.” Then Bill Wells of the St. Louis paper and several other reporters said they were going too. Then a man Maurice had never seen before came up and said, “Maurice, I've been looking for you. I'll be in your debt if you'll present me to Dana Moon and Captain Early.”

Maurice was certain he had never seen the man before this. For how could he have forgotten him? The gleaming store teeth and waxed guardsman mustache twirled to dagger points-

“Colonel Billy Washington, at your service, Maurice.”

– the pure-white Stetson, the tailored buckskin coat with white fringe, the black polished boots with gold tassels in front-

“You've heard of me, have you?”

“Yes sir, I certainly have,” Maurice said. God, all this happening at once. “I just have never seen you in person before.”

“Well, you see me now,” Colonel Washington said.

Bo Catlett rode up out of the barranca and crossed the open ground to the wall. He said to the people standing behind it, “They on the way.”

“How many?” asked Bren.

“Say a hundred, give or take.” Bo Catlett rode into the yard before stepping down, pulled his carbine from the boot and slapped his mount toward the smell of feed and water over in the corral.

“Five to one,” Bren said, sounding pleased.

Kate looked at him, her Henry resting on the wall. Moon gazed down the slope, past the open ground to the trough of the barranca. He could see figures now, a line of tiny dark specks coming up the switchback trail, through the field of saguaro.

Bren raised the field glasses hanging from his neck and studied the enemy approaching. “Straggling…close it up there!”

Moon looked at his Apaches. They looked at him, faces painted now with streaks of ochre. He turned to look at the Mexicans lining the wall: Eladio with his sword and green sash among the farmers in white cotton.

“Tell 'em to get ready,” Bren said, field glasses at his face.

“You don't have to stay,” Moon said in Spanish. “No one is asked to fight one hundred men.”

The Indians and the Mexicans remained at the wall, looking from Moon to the slope. They saw another of the colored men now, Thomas Jefferson, coming across the open ground and through the gate space in the wall.

“They dismounting, like to come as skirmishers.”

Bren lowered his glasses and called out, “Come on! Take your medicine like little men!…Christ, what're they fooling around down there for?”

Moon said to Bo Catlett, “They'd do better to stay mounted and run at us.”

“Man never soldiered,” Bo said. “Can see he don't know doodly shit what he's doing.”

The sound of firing came from down the slope now…the tiny figures spreading out, moving up slowly, dropping down to fire, waiting, moving up again.

“Christ, it'll take 'em till tomorrow,” Bren said. The Mexican farmers were raising their rifles. “Not yet,” Moon said in Spanish. “If you shoot now I think they won't come close enough. We want them up there on the open ground.”

“We get them up,” Bo said.

“What's your signal?” Moon asked him.

“Three quick ones. My boys'll light the fuses and get.”

Moon held his hand out. In a moment Bren noticed and handed him the glasses. Moon studied the figures coming up through the brush and fencepost saguaros. He raised his gaze to a high point on one side of the barranca, then moved across to the other side where the barranca, narrowed and Bo Catlett's powdermen had planted the charges. The tiny figures dotting the slope were coming up through the narrowing of the trough and spreading out again, more of them firing now, the closest nearing two hundred yards. They could blow the charges now and wipe out about a quarter of Sundeen's men and send the rest running. But that wasn't the plan. No, Bren had promised Sundeen safe passage-one general to another. That was all right. Because the plan was to get them all up on high ground, in the open, then blow the narrows and cut off their retreat, prevent them from falling back to cover. Get them milling around in the open and shoot the spirit right out of them, blow Sundeen to his reward and close the book. That was the plan.

The first skirmishers were approaching a hundred and fifty yards now, snapping shots and moving up, feeling the excitement of it probably, feeling braver and with no one shooting back. Moon moved his glasses over them to pick out Sundeen. Not in the first bunch…there he was with his funneled hat and silver buckles, crossed gunbelts and a six-shooter in each hand, waving his men to come on, goddamn it, get up there.

Moon set the glasses on the wall and raised his Big-Fifty Sharps.

“Don't you do it,” Bren said.

Moon said, “I'm just seeing how easy it would be.”

“Let him come up all the way.”

Pretty soon now.

The skirmishers were firing from a hundred yards and the tail end of Sundeen's men was moving through the narrows. The firing increased. Sundeen positioned a line of shooters behind cover, just across the open ground-about twenty of them-gave a signal and they all fired at once.

Seeing this about to happen, the people behind the wall ducked down or went to one knee. All except Bren Early. After the second fusillade he said, “At Fredericksburg, where Doubleday's Iron Brigade stood up to the Rebel guns, D.H. Hill sent a flag of truce over with his compliments to General Doubleday-”

Another volley ripped out from the brush slope. Bren tried not to hunch his shoulders.

“-saying he had never in his experience seen infantry stand and suffer casualties under artillery fire more bravely.”

Moon said, “You have got something in your head about having to die to win glory. If that's the deal, I pass…Bo, let's close the back door. Give your troopers the signal.”

Bren, standing, said, “Hold there,” and picked up the glasses from the wall. “Some more are coming up behind.”