Jory Sherman: Blood Sky at Morning

“I am called Felipe. Felipe Lopez. You will not shoot me, eh?”

“I ask the questions, Felipe.”

“Ask me anything. Just do not shoot me. Take the pony. There is no need to kill me over a horse.”

“I want to know who those men were. They were riding those ponies yesterday.”

“Men? What men? I do not know what you are talking about.”

“Don’t lie to me, Felipe, or you’ll hear a rattle.”

“A rattle?”

“Yeah, a rattle. That’ll be the rattlesnake you stepped on, and that would be me. That’s all you’ll hear before I blow your lamp out. I want to know who those men were, who they work for and where they went.”

Felipe said nothing for several seconds, as if he were weighing his chances, or trying to think up a good lie for the gringo.

“There were some men,” he said. “They rode up here and traded those ponies for six of my good horses. My best horses. They were outlaws, I think. They did not pay me. They rode off. I do not know where they went.”

Zak knew the man was lying. He thought he was a pretty good liar. Likely, he’d had a lot of practice.

“That was a good story, Felipe. You ought to thank me.”

“Thank you? Why?”

“For letting you stay alive a few more minutes. Now, maybe you can live even longer by telling me the truth.”

“That is the truth. I swear it on my mother’s honor.”

“I doubt your mother has any honor, Felipe. I heard she was a whore.”

Felipe’s eyes narrowed to slits. The skin of his face stretched taut as his lips compressed, his teeth clenched.

“ Ten cuidado ,” Felipe said, his voice a gruff whisper.

Zak looked straight into the man’s flashing brown eyes.

“Be careful,” Felipe had said in Spanish. And Felipe’s body tensed into a coiled spring. He was like a tiger ready to pounce, Zak knew. Like a tiger cornered. He was a man without an ounce of fear. His mother’s name had been besmirched by a gringo. There were few insults more scathing than calling a man’s mother a whore.

Felipe was ready to fight.

To defend his mother’s honor, dubious as that honor might be, Felipe was ready to die.

Chapter 6

Zak knew how dangerous Felipe had become. He’d just been slapped in the face with an insult so foul and demeaning that it had cut through to the core of the man’s being. Few things were more sacred to a man than the woman who had given him life, his mother. Felipe was ready to put his life on the line in defense of the woman who had birthed him.

“All you have to do, Felipe,” Zak said, “is tell me the truth and I’ll take back what I said about your mother.”

“It is too late for that,” Felipe said.

“I’ll find those men anyway. I do not need to know their names. I do not need you to tell me where they went. I will find them.”

Felipe drew back, cocked his head and looked more closely at Zak.

“Who are you?” he said. “What do you call yourself?”

“Cody.”

Felipe spewed air through his nostrils.

“Are you the one they call Jinete de Sombra ?”

“I am sometimes called ‘Shadow Rider.’”

“Because you wear the black clothes and ride the black horse.”

“No,” Zak said. “Because I am like a shadow. I come upon a man with no sound. I am not seen and I am not heard until it is too late.”

“Ah, I wondered. You are the Indian fighter. You are the one who rode with the general they call Crook.”

“I am the one.”

“Then, perhaps you come here to kill Apaches, no?”

“Maybe,” Zak said.

“Then you and I, we are on the same side. I, too, would kill Apaches. And the men you seek. They, too, wish all the Apaches killed. Maybe you would like to join them.”

“Maybe.”

“That is why you hunt them?”

“I wish to talk to them, yes.”

“I think they would like to talk to you, Cody.”

“Now we are getting somewhere, Felipe. I want to know who those men were who painted themselves like Apaches, rode the ponies here. I want to know who they work for.”

“You ask much, Cody. But I will tell you so that you will go and leave me alone. Perhaps I will see you again one day.”

“Perhaps.”

“The men you look for have gone to Tucson. You must see a man named Ferguson. He owns the freight line.”

“I am looking for a man named Ben Trask,” Cody said.

“Ah, you know this man?”

“Yes, I know him.”

“You are friends, no?”

Cody didn’t answer. He let the question hang and watched Felipe squirm inside his skin. He could almost see the man’s mind working, the way his forehead wrinkled up and his nose crinkled, making his eyes squint.

“This one, Trask, he is there. He works for Ferguson.”

That was all Zak wanted to hear.

Trask was just the kind of man to stir up trouble with the Apaches, but he’d bet money that he had something else on his mind, as well. Trask might be working for Ferguson, but he was also working for himself, perhaps looking for an opportunity to make some illegal money.

“All right, Felipe. I’m leaving now.”

“You do not want another horse?”

“No. You keep them.”

Zak looked around at the ground, the maze of wagon tracks. The adobe with its adjoining jacal was some kind of way station, he was sure. Someone had to haul in fodder for the horses, food and supplies for Felipe. He wondered how many such stations were scattered over the territory. Someone had gone to a great amount of trouble to stir up hatred against the Apaches.

“What have you got inside that adobe?” Zak asked suddenly.

“Nothing.”

“I want to take a look.”

“No. This is not permitted.”

“Are you hiding something in there?”

“No. I hide nothing.”

“I think you are, Felipe. Step aside. I’m going to take a look.”

Felipe hesitated. Zak took a step toward him, his right hand dropping to the butt of his pistol. It was a menacing move, deliberate, and Felipe got the message.

“Go inside, then.”

“You first,” Zak said.

Felipe shrugged. He turned and stepped inside, Cody right behind him. The hovel smelled of wood smoke and stale whiskey. A potbelly stove stood near the back wall, its fire gone out, but still leaking smoke from around its door and at a loose place on the pipe. A pot of coffee stood atop it, still steaming. Several bottles of whiskey lay on the floor, and half-empty bottles sat on a grimy table in the center of the room. The bunk in a corner reeked of sweat. On a sideboard he found several small cans of paint and brushes that had not yet been cleaned with the linseed oil standing nearby, next to a grimy wooden bowl.

Something caught Zak’s eye in another corner. He walked over, his stomach swirling with a sensation like winged insects.

“What’s this?” he said as Felipe stood there, his face waxen.

“I do not know. Those were there when I came here.”

“Bullshit,” Zak said as he picked up an army canteen. A blue officer’s uniform lay in a heap. Silver lieutenant’s bars gleamed from the shoulders of the tunic. A pair of cavalryman’s boots, shiny, with a patina of dust on them, spurs still attached, stood against the wall behind the pile of clothes.

“I do not know who left those clothes,” Felipe said.

“Do you know the name of the man who owns them?”

“No.”

“Maybe you know Lieutenant Ted O’Hara.”

“I do not know him,” Felipe said.

Zak had seen enough. He was sure that Ted O’Hara had been brought to this place. They had stripped him of his uniform, put civilian clothes on him, perhaps. Then they had taken him someplace else. A hostage, maybe? A bargaining chip? Or maybe to torture him for information about the location of Apache camps, knowledge they somehow knew he possessed.