Lookout Hill (9781101606735) (18 page)

“Up you go, Billy Boyle. You’re under arrest,” said a voice with a dark chuckle.

Another voice added, “Keep fighting us and I’ll crack your skull open.”

“I have his gun,” said another in stiff English.

Uh-oh!
Boyle recognized the Russian’s voice from the year before. Pettigo’s mercenaries had sworn they would kill him if he ever returned.

“I’m not fighting you. I swear I’m not!” he said, feeling hands lift him off his feet. “This is a mistake. I’m only passing through town. I’m not here looking for any trouble!”

He felt himself slung over a shoulder like a bag of seed and carried away, out the tent fly and down the dirt street.

In a moment he felt himself carried across a boardwalk,
through a squeaking door and plopped down onto a wooden chair.

Even as someone jerked the sack from over him, he spit lint and said quickly, “I swear to God I haven’t come here to…” His words trailed as he looked into the grim face of the Russian.

“Shut your face up,” Cherzi said, holding Boyle’s gun in his big hand.

Boyle stared at him in fear.

“Don’t soil yourself, hombre,” said Bellibar. “We’re all out for the same thing here.”

“Oh? What’s that?” Boyle said, looking back and forth at them.

“Robbing the Pettigo-American Mining Company,” said Bellibar. He grinned. But the gunman looked suspicious.

“Then why did you snatch me up like this?” he asked.

“To keep from having to kill you,” said Bellibar. “We needed to talk to you. You wouldn’t have come peaceful-like, would you?”

“No, probably not,” said Boyle.

“Also we didn’t want to tip our hand to anybody here, let them see what we’re up to,” Bellibar said. “I’m the new sheriff, Bobby Hugh Bellibar. These are my deputies, Aces Siebert and Cherzi something or other. We’re the ones who’s keeping all you thieves from Lookout Hill away from here.”

Boyle relaxed a little and said, “Damn, I’ve heard of you, Bellibar, you too, Siebert. You two would steal a hot stove with no gloves on.”

“This I would do too,” the Russian said proudly.

“All right, then…what can I do for you, Sheriff?” Boyle said.

“You can ride up to Lookout Hill with me, keep me from getting shot until I can explain myself. Once I put things right with the Cadys,” said Bellibar, “we’ll all ride up this damn one-way gully and take what we want.”

Juan Lupo and the Ranger sat atop a cliff overlooking a stretch of hilltops and high trails winding upward toward Lookout Hill. Both manhunters gazed down respectively, Sam through a long, battered telescope, Lupo through a shabby pair of binoculars. Watching three riders gallop up along the rocky winding trail, Sam got a good look at Hodding Siebert’s face as the outlaw looked up and all around, warily.

“It’s Aces Siebert,” Sam said.

“Yes, I saw him too,” Lupo said. “That is Billy Boyle leading them up.”

“There’s little doubt in my mind the rider beside him is Bobby Hugh Bellibar,” Sam added. He shook his head, lowered the field lens and rubbed his eye. “Somehow these two maniacs managed to get back together.”

“And found someone to lead them to the Cadys,” Lupo said, lowering his binoculars.

“How far are we from the trail they’re on?” Sam asked.

“By the time we ride back and over to pick up their
trail, they will have made it into the protection of Lookout Hill. We will never get into the Cadys’ lair on our own. The trail is too well guarded. They see everything coming up the trail for miles. There’s no other way up to them.”

“What about by rope?” Sam said, gesturing toward a high-standing vertical wall of rock on the northern side of the steep hill.

Lupo didn’t answer. Instead he scooted back from the edge of the cliff, stood up and dusted his trousers.

“We must wait until these men ride back down to Copper Gully,” he said, nodding southwardly. “The trail they ride comes from there.”

“Then we ride over to their trail and wait right there,” Sam said. “Let’s hope the Cadys want nothing to do with these two.”

The Ranger still suspected that Lupo wasn’t being entirely truthful about what he was up to out here. It was time to squeeze a little more information out of him.

“
Sí
, we could wait right there,” Lupo said. He looked restlessly back in the direction of Copper Gully. “But if we go to Barranca del Cobre, they are sure to come there when they ride down from Lookout Hill.”

Sure to come there?

Sam stared at him and said, “How do we know they’ll even come down at all? These two could lie under the Cadys’ protection for weeks.”

“This is true,” said Lupo, “but I think—”

“Get it out, Easy John,” Sam said, cutting him off.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Lupo said innocently.

“Tell me what it is that’s got you wanting to give up chasing these two riders to Copper Gully. For a bounty hunter, you’re sure letting your prey slip out of your reach.”

“No, you are wrong, Ranger,” Lupo insisted. “You misread my intentions.”

“If I’m misreading your intentions, I can
misread
them sitting right here. I don’t have to ride to Copper Gully to do it.” He paused, then said, “You’re after something bigger than the reward on these two murdering saddle tramps. I don’t know what it is, but I’ve seen the clock start ticking ever since we rode up this high trail.” He gave a short, wry smile. “I’m curious to hear what it is.” He remained seated on the rocky ground as he collapsed the telescope and appeared to make himself comfortable for the long stay.

Lupo looked back in the direction of Copper Gully for a moment, then looked back at the Ranger.

“All right, Ranger,” said Lupo, “you are right. The clock is ticking…and there is more at stake than the reward on these two murdering
vagabundos.
But I cannot tell you everything. The people I work for would never forgive me.”

“I’m sure they would, Easy John,” Sam said. He picked up his rifle from against a rock and held it pointed loosely at the government agent. “Tell them I held a gun on you.”

“Put your rifle away,” said Lupo. “They would not accept that as a reason for me to reveal my mission.”

“Your
mission
…,” Sam said. “Now we’re getting somewhere.” He let his rifle slump onto his lap.

Lupo took a deep breath and let it out in a sigh.

“I will tell you a story, Ranger Burrack,” he said, “and you must believe it or disbelieve it, as you choose.”

“Fair enough.” Sam nodded and listened intently.

“Over a year ago, I tracked a wagonload of stolen gold to Fire River Valley and recovered it for my government. Instead of taking it directly back to Mexico City, I buried it in the desert to keep it from being stolen again. But when my government recovered it from the desert, the man they sent to lead the mission was not loyal to my emperor or to
Generalissimo
Manuel Ortega, whom I serve. His loyalties lie with corrupt Anglo commerce interests who extort my people and bleed my country’s resources.”

Politics. Be careful,
Sam warned himself.

He sat watching, listening, knowing the truth was now coming out.
But how much?
He’d have to decide that for himself.

“Instead of taking all of the gold back to Mexico City, he diverted much of it to his
Americano
associates. The gold is in the custody of the Pettigo-American Mining Company. It sits in a wagon, under guard, in a building that no worker is allowed to enter.”

“How reliable is your information?” Sam asked.

“I found this out from peasant mine workers who did not realize how valuable their information was to me. So the gold has not yet been moved to a new location. How reliable is it?” He gave a short shrug. “It explains why the Cadys are always dead set on robbing a payroll which is modest at best, from a mine whose defenses are next to impenetrable.”

Sam considered it.

“If all you’re telling me is true,” he offered, “why not send a troop of
federales
up to Pettigo-American, retrieve the gold and be done with it?”

“If only it were that easy, Ranger,” Lupo said. “It is a fragile relationship my government has with yours. My poor country needs the help of honest American commerce and business. But along with the honest Anglo businessmen comes a bad element. And I’m afraid the Pettigos are the very worst of that bad element. Yet, if a force of
federales
enter an American mining enterprise, it would have dire and far-reaching consequences. Other American business would give pause to coming here.”

Sam gave him a curious gaze.

“So you weren’t interested in tracking down Siebert and Bellibar, or even in getting up to Lookout Hill. Your only interest is Pettigo-American Mining.”

“And recovering my country’s gold without turning it into conflict between our governments,” Lupo added.

“You were pulling me into this knowing that my being here can have nothing to do with political matters,” Sam said.

“I am still trying to pull you into this, Ranger,” said Lupo. “I have no choice.”

“Your government sent you alone, to get in and out the best way you can?” Sam shook his head. “That sounds real shaky, Easy John.”

“I had three valuable contacts established,” said Lupo. “One was Wilton Marrs, a leader among the Cadys’ Lookout Hill boys. But as we know, outlaws have a
habit of killing each other for little or no reason. In Marrs’ case, the Cadys saw that he was gaining too much respect among their men.”

“You said
three
contacts,” Sam said.

“The other two, Paco Reyes and Saginaw Sparks, were killed right after telling me the Cadys were getting ready to launch a large attack on the Pettigos,” said Lupo. “But after our meeting, I heard shots on the trail ahead of me and found their bodies there.”

“One of our boys?” Sam asked.

“Yes, Bellibar,” said Lupo. “I saw him later, riding on the trail below me.”

“Then you spotted me,” said Sam. “You saw that I was on his trail. You started following me.”

“It is true, Ranger,” said Lupo. “I followed you until my horse came upon a bull rattler, spooked and fell over a cliff.” He gave a slight smile. “Knowing you had a spare horse, I had to come announce myself.”

“That’s your whole story?” Sam asked.

“Yes, it is,” said Lupo. “I hope you believe it’s the truth, because I need your help—my country needs your help.” He paused, then asked, “
Do
you believe it is the truth?”

Sam gave a slight shrug. It was as much truth as he’d ever get out of a spy like him, he decided.

“Will you help me, Ranger?” Lupo asked in a somber tone. “It will put me in your debt. Anything I can assist you with to make your job less difficult, you will have only to ask—”

Sam raised a hand, cutting him short, still considering the political complexion of this.

“I’m only after Bellibar and Siebert. Nothing has changed,” he said. “But if my interest and yours work out to be the same, so much for coincidence.” As he spoke, he stood up from the ground and dusted his trousers. “We’ll leave these two running free for now, if that helps you make your plans. But get your plans laid fast. The
next
time I see these men is the
last
time I ever want to see them.”

The Russian, Cherzi Persocovich, didn’t see his two fellow mercenaries ride into town. The half-breed, Clayton “Cold Foot” Cain, and the former assassin, Newton Ridge, deliberately circled around behind the town and rode in from the same direction any gunman on the prowl would use if that person was riding down from Lookout Hill. When neither the Russian nor Leonard Tiggs, or the new man, Bob Hughes, confronted them, Ridge turned in his saddle to the half-breed as they walked their horses toward the tent cantina.

“If this was a test to see who’s on their toes here, Tiggs and Cherzi failed by a long shot,” he said.

“What about the new sheriff?” Cold Foot asked, staring straight ahead.

“The new sheriff…yeah, right,” Ridge said cynically. He spit and ran a gloved hand across his lips. “Far as I’m concerned, this Bob Hughes is a broken wheel getting ready to slip its hub.”