Joe Millard - The Good the Bad and the Ugly

Mondrega’s eyes flickered open at Baker’s movement, stared blankly around far a moment, then closed again.

The court martial, held in Santa Fe’s Palace of Governors was little more than a formality. A lieutenant testified to finding the entire cavalry escort dead in the pass and bringing in the bodies for identification and burial.

Jackson was next on the stand. His story was brief and convincing. He had been the first one hit and knocked from the seat. Then Mondrega and Baker, in succession, had taken bullets and fallen across him, drenching him with their blood.

“Pretty soon the shooting stopped and the Yankees came to the wagon. I kept still and they thought we were all corpses, I guess. They hauled out the chest and were starting to chop it open when something scared the mules and they bolted.”

“Was there no pursuit, Private Jackson?”

“No, sir. I guess they figured a wagonload of corpses wasn’t worth the trouble. After a while I got loose and got the wagon stopped. I did what I could for the others and found the trail to Santa Fe. That’s all I know, sir.”

Mondrega, one arm in a sling and his head swathed in a turban of bandages, had listened intently to Jackson’s testimony. He had nothing to add on the stand.

“I saw Private Jackson falling. Then I was hit and fell on him. That’s all I remember until I awoke here in the infirmary.”

A surgeon followed him to the stand.

“Private Baker is still in critical condition and unable to appear or testify. He is out of his head most of the time but in lucid moments he recalls only seeing the others go down and then receiving his own wound. In his delirium he appears to be obessed with dying. He mumbles constantly of graves and graveyards.”

Mondrega started violently at the words. His eyes widened. He controlled himself with a visible effort and sat back, his expression carefully veiled.

The presiding officer struck the table with his gavel. “In the absence of evidence to the contrary, this court concludes that the two hundred thousand dollars fell into the hands of the enemy through no fault of Private Jackson. We hereby find him not guilty of any misconduct. Court dismissed.”

A short time later a sergeant appeared in the office of the colonel commanding. He saluted.

“Sir, it is my duty to report that Private Jackson is gone.”

“Gone? What do you mean—gone?”

“Right after the trial, sir, he gathered up all his personal belongings, stole the lieutenant’s horse and skedaddled.”

CHAPTER 2

HIS name—Sentenza—was known and feared from Texas to the Tetons. Some men crossed themselves at its mention. Others swung hastily to their horses and left the country. Still others reached for fat purses and smiled and prepared to pay off, thinking of enemies who would plague them no longer.

Sentenza was rangy, lean and hard. He possessed the lithe grace of a catamount. His wedge-shaped face was the colour of old saddle leather. His high cheekbones set off eyes of palest brown. In his long blue frock coat—his habitual costume—he could be mistaken for a circuit-riding preacher until the coat fell open to reveal the most notorious gun in the West. It rested above his left hip, the butt slanting to the right for a lightning-fast cross-draw that no man had ever matched. It featured a custom-made fourteen-inch barrel for balance and accuracy.

By profession Sentenza was a hired killer. His deadly skill was for sale to any man who could pay the price. It was said that he would gun down his own mother without a qualm if someone hired him for the task and Sentenza himself had never denied the charge. If he had ever known emotions they had long since burned to ashes. He neither loved nor hated. He only killed.

He smiled seldom. Sometimes, in fanciful moments he thought of himself as already dead. The thought sharpened his enjoyment of living.

He dismounted in front of the adobe ranch house. Leaving his handsome coal-black horse at the worn hitchrail, he stood for a moment, looking at the house.

The door was open. After a moment he walked in on silent feet.

A pretty Mexican woman was in the act of setting a wooden bowl of beans and a chunk of crusty bread before a young boy in his teens, obviously her son. She and the boy looked up, startled at the sudden appearance of Sentenza.

He stared at them, silent and unsmiling, until a look of fear came into the woman’s eyes. She caught the boy’s arm and drew him out of the chair. Watching the stranger from frightened eyes, she backed away, pulling the boy with her. She darted through an inner door.

A faint mutter of voices reached Sentenza. Then a swarthy man stepped into the room. He studied Sentenza, frowning faintly.

“What may I do for you, señor ?”

“You’re Mondrega?”

The swarthy man nodded.

“And I know you, too, now. Yost are the gunman they call Sentenza.”

“My reputation has travelled far,” the killer said with a dead smile. “But for that matter, so have I—and without food. I thank you for your generous hospitality.”

He sat down at the boy’s place, broke off a piece of the bread and began to eat the beans with a wooden spoon. The other watched him steadily from wary eyes.

After a moment he said, “Baker sent you, didn’t he?”

Sentenza nodded, his mouth full of beans and bread.

Slowly Mondrega pulled back a chair and sat down opposite the visitor. He put both palms flat on the plank table and bent forward.

“Tell Baker I have already told him everything I know. Tell him all I want is to be left in peace, understand? It will do him no good to keep on bothering me. I don’t know anything more than I’ve already told him about that damned boxful of gold dollars.”

There was a barely perceptible break in the rhythm of Sentenza’s chewing. He swallowed heavily.

“How many gold dollars?”

“Two hundred thousand, they said.”

Sentenza’s pale eyes narrowed.

“No wonder Baker was close-mouthed about this business. Now I know why the names seemed familiar. The missing Confederate cavalry fund. Tell me more about the dollars, Mondrega”

“How can I?” the Mexican said, with a trace of irritation. “ I was unconscious almost the entire time.”

“Almost?”

Mondrega spread his hands. “I must have come to for a moment once, in my mind is a picture of graves, thousands of them on a hillside. I thought it was only another of the crazy dreams until I learned at the hearing that Baker also had babbled of graves. But Baker already knows that because I told him. I swear I have told no one else until now, señor .”

“Baker knows something else, too. He knows that Jackson came to see you last week. Is it true Jackson came here? Or is Baker wrong about that?”

“He’s not wrong. Jackson did come here.”

“What name is he using now? What does he call himself?”

Mondrega’s eyes narrowed.

“What makes you think he has changed his name?”

“Because I haven’t found him. When I look for someone I always find him—eventually. That’s what I’m usually paid for. And Baker will also want to know why Jackson came here, what he wanted to know and what he said about that box.”

“He wanted the same thing Baker wants—to find out how much I know and to make sure I would not talk.”

The ghost of a smile touched the gunman’s lips.

“By some strange coincidence, Baker sent me to make sure of the same thing.”

The silence grew. Beads of perspiration began to dot Mondrega’s forehead.

He asked hoarsely, “How much is Baker paying you to kill me?”

“Five hundred dollars.” Sentenza pursued a last bean around the bottom of the bowl. “It’s my standard price for easy jobs like this. But I’m waiting for that name you’re going to tell me fast—Jackson’s new name.”