The Gallows Gang Read online

  It was getting light, the sides of the canyon being visible as brooding slabs of rock that made his neck ache and his head swim before his gaze reached the top.

  He lowered his eyes and saw that he was lying beside the river. The Preacher was sitting beside him with his legs drawn up to his chin, looking at the water.

  The last thing Nathaniel remembered was falling from the cage and tumbling down into the canyon. The water had been rushing up to meet him, but after that he could recall events in only scrappy, feverish bursts as if he was seeing them by lightning flashes.

  The bone-rattling blow of hitting the river, the downwards rush through the cold water, more downward motion, fighting for air, a temporary emergence above water before the river reclaimed him….

  Then there were other disjointed memories of Bible quotations and of a strong arm that wrapped itself around his chest and tugged.

  He twisted and raised himself on to his elbows so that he could look up at The Preacher. Then he summed up those events in one simple declaration.

  ‘You saved my life,’ he said.

  Admittedly with them being chained together The Preacher had had no choice but to save his life, assuming, that is, that he had wanted to live. Previously his behaviour had been so bizarre and uninterested in what was happening to him that Nathaniel wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d let the river take them both away.

  He waited for The Preacher to acknowledge him but that individual continued to watch the water roil by, so Nathaniel stretched himself, finding that, aside from the bruises that announced their presence, he had survived the fall intact.

  Feeling stronger now, he rolled himself round to adopt the same posture as The Preacher had, sitting beside him. There, he craned his neck, but he couldn’t see the point at which they’d gone over the edge, nor the cage. So he couldn’t tell whether they were immediately below that point, or whether they’d drifted downriver.

  One thing was certain to him though. If he wanted to remain free for any length of time he couldn’t assume that nobody would come down into the canyon to check whether anyone in the cage had survived the fall. They had to get moving.

  With the shared manacles around his wrists and ankles that meant he was going nowhere unless he found a way to communicate and agree on a course of action with The Preacher.

  He took a deep breath and put on a conversational voice, as if the last few traumatic hours hadn’t happened and they were just two men enjoying a pleasant chat beside the river.

  ‘I’m grateful to you for what you did,’ he said.

  Nathaniel gave him a minute to reply, but The Preacher ignored him.

  ‘Is there anything you want from me in return?’

  He waited, but again The Preacher ignored him.

  ‘Do you have a name other than The Preacher?’ he tried, without success.

  ‘Then my name is Nathaniel McBain.’

  Nathaniel was considering what his next comment should be when The Preacher swung his gaze down to consider him, this being the first time Nathaniel could remember him responding to an invitation to speak.

  ‘When Jesus saw Nathaniel approaching,’ The Preacher said, ‘he said of him, “Here is a true Israelite, in whom there is nothing false”. John one, verse forty-seven.’

  Nathaniel judged this a good thing, both for the fact that The Preacher had spoken to him and for what he had said.

  ‘I believe there is nothing false about me.’ Nathaniel paused, giving The Preacher a chance to speak, but the man didn’t take up the offer. ‘I’d aimed to live a good life when I got out, but then I got wrongly accused of killing Ramsey Carr and ended up in that cage bound for the gallows.’

  This didn’t interest The Preacher and the small amount of curiosity in his eyes faded away as he returned to looking at the water.

  ‘Who is this other Nathaniel?’ Nathaniel persisted. ‘Tell me about him.’

  The Preacher didn’t take up the opportunity.

  So for the next ten minutes Nathaniel talked, hoping he might happen across a comment that would interest The Preacher, stopping from time to time to give him a chance to interject, but the man passed up every opportunity.

  Nathaniel spoke of his previous desire to seek a new life and how that hope had been cruelly curtailed. He spoke of his hatred of Turner Jackson for what he’d done, both back at Beaver Ridge and in trying to kill them. He spoke of his desire to ultimately find freedom and to start a new life.

  Although he didn’t get a response, talking let him put his own thoughts in order and that told him what he had to do next.

  He had somehow to clear his name. To do that he had to find Turner Jackson and make him speak the truth. Even if he couldn’t get that from him, at the very least he would kill the man who had condemned him to the gallows then tried to blow him up.

  That resolve returned him to his original problem: that unless he planned to carry The Preacher to wherever Turner was he needed his help.

  He quietened and considered the only comment that had produced a reply so far. He decided that direct questions of a kind that usually worked on other people didn’t work on this man. He needed to voice neutral comments that happened to include a biblical context. He had little knowledge of the Bible, so he looked at the river, as The Preacher was doing, and tried to think what might be going through his mind.

  ‘The river is soothing,’ he ventured.

  ‘This water,’ The Preacher said, speaking for the first time in a while, ‘symbolizes baptism that now saves you also, Peter three, verse twenty-one.’

  Nathaniel smiled, accepting that his dunking in the water had been a baptism of sorts.

  ‘I suppose I did feel reborn when I came up out of the river.’

  ‘And the priests came up out of the river carrying the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord, Joshua four, verse eighteen.’

  Nathaniel had no idea what this meant, but he was at least getting responses. He raised his eyes to the lightening sky above the canyon rim.

  ‘A new day dawns,’ he said.

  The Preacher followed his gaze. ‘The path of the righteous is like the first gleam of dawn, shining ever brighter till the full light of day, Proverbs four, verse eighteen.’

  ‘The path of the righteous,’ Nathaniel intoned, seizing on the element of that statement that suggested movement, then he cast a glance downriver. The Preacher followed the direction of Nathaniel’s gaze, then rocked himself forward and stood, dragging Nathaniel up to a kneeling position.

  ‘The path of the righteous is level.’ The Preacher thrust his hands forward, dragging Nathaniel with him. ‘O upright One, you make the way of the righteous smooth, Isaiah twenty-seven, verse seven.’

  Then he set off walking.

  Nathaniel hadn’t been prepared for him to suddenly accept his suggestion about leaving, so The Preacher stumbled as Nathaniel tried to get his legs moving. Then he got to his feet and fell into stride with The Preacher, hobbling over the stones on his unshod feet.

  Within a few paces he matched The Preacher’s walking pace and so they strode along beside the river.

  Although he didn’t want to risk making The Preacher stop now that he was in motion, Nathaniel couldn’t help but continue to explore how he might communicate with his odds and for now constant, companion.

  ‘The upright one awaits,’ he said, trying to get into the spirit of The Preacher’s utterances.

  For some reason this comment made The Preacher snort his breath, then stop and swirl round to face Nathaniel, his face darkening.

  ‘The godly have been swept from the land; not one upright man remains.’ He grabbed Nathaniel’s collar and dragged him up close, spitting his words into his face. ‘All men lie in wait to shed blood; each hunts his brother with a net, Micah seven, verse two.’

  Then The Preacher released his collar and resumed walking. Nathaniel had no idea what that had meant either, but on reconsidering the words, he decided they hinted at a common purpose, perhaps ev
en of revenge.

  That thought made Nathaniel recall one of the few Bible quotations he knew.

  ‘An eye for an eye,’ he said, although he presumed he hadn’t remembered the exact words, ‘a tooth for a tooth.’

  ‘Exodus twenty-one, verse twenty-four,’ The Preacher said, nodding as he speeded the pace of his walking.

  The women out at the back were wailing again.

  Javier Rodriguez thumped the table in irritation, then swirled round to glare at the post-owner.

  ‘Tell them to be quiet,’ he demanded. ‘They’re being paid enough.’

  ‘They aren’t,’ the post-owner said, coming out from behind the trading post’s counter with two jugs of beer. ‘They’re my daughters. And they weren’t for sale.’

  Javier glared at him, wondering if he had shown too much defiance, then leaned back for him to place the jugs on the table. When the post-owner had released the handles, Javier shot out an arm and grabbed his wrist.

  ‘Any more complaints,’ he muttered, ‘and you won’t get to enjoy our custom again.’

  The post-owner snorted, clearly debating whether to mention that Javier hadn’t paid for any of the vast amount of liquor his group had consumed; then he nodded and returned to the counter.

  ‘What we doing next?’ Mitch Cartwright asked.

  ‘I ain’t decided,’ Javier said, ‘but I’ve got us this far. Trust me. You’ll enjoy what comes next.’

  Mitch nodded, mollified, but his comment had only gone to make Javier feel even more unsettled.

  He didn’t know what he wanted to do next.

  They’d reached a trading post fifty miles out of Bear Creek and around the same distance from the scene of their escape, so he felt confident that they had thrown off any pursuit.

  But previously, when he’d ridden with Pablo, he had always been the one suggesting ideas, which his brother had then usually rejected. Now, this second chance had given him the feeling that he didn’t want to live in his brother’s shadow any more. With seven ruthless and newly freed condemned men at his side, this was perhaps a chance for him to act on his own.

  ‘We should have seen whether Hiram Deeds had any more dynamite,’ Turner Jackson said, grinning. ‘Then we could have blown this trading post to hell.’

  Javier supped his drink while this comment gathered a round of enthusiastic grunts. Even in the short time he’d spent with these men, he’d gathered that Turner took greater delight at the thought of killing than was normal even amongst men of this type. Blowing things up appeared to give him especial delight.

  Over at the counter the post-owner grumbled, making Javier put down his drink and glare at him.

  ‘What did you say?’ he demanded.

  ‘I said,’ the post-owner said, raising his chin defiantly,

  ‘I thought Pablo Rodriguez was bad, but his brother is even worse.’

  Oddly this comment pleased Javier and he leaned back in his chair to look around the post. Several of the men were outside with the post-owner’s daughters and those who were inside were riffling through the post’s wares with a view to taking what they’d need to remain self-sufficient for as long as possible.

  Turner picked up on Javier’s more contented mood with surprising speed.

  ‘Is that worse or better?’ he asked.

  ‘Depends on which end of a gun you’re standing,’ Javier said.

  Turner nodded, as if his off-hand comment had contained more wisdom than he’d intended.

  ‘So does that mean we’re striking out on our own instead of rejoining your brother’s gang?’

  ‘We might,’ Javier said, leaning forward, intrigued at the way Turner had picked up on his thoughts, almost before he’d finished having them himself.

  ‘I’d have thought,’ Mitch said, watching this exchange with bemusement, ‘you’d want to continue riding with Pablo after he tried to free you.’

  ‘He only did what you’d expect,’ Casey Dawson said, breaking into the conversation for the first time, ‘when his brother was behind bars.’

  Casey’s comment finally let Javier identify his concern.

  ‘I am not Pablo Rodriguez’s brother,’ he snapped, shaking a fist as he glared at Casey. ‘He’s my brother.’

  Mitch and Casey furrowed their brows, murmuring that they didn’t understand, but Turner nodded, instantly seeing what he meant.

  ‘You said we’d blaze a trail that’d live in legend for a thousand years,’ he said. ‘I reckon we will and once we’re through, nobody will ever speak of Pablo Rodriguez again, just Javier.’

  Javier nodded, then raised the jug to pour himself another glass. Ideas were already forming about all the things Pablo had never wanted to do, which he was now free to explore: train ambushes, the railroad payroll, a new life in Mexico with a woman at his side like Narcissa Maxwell….

  But then a particularly loud scream rose up from outside, making them all look to the door. The door remained closed, but movement caught his eye over by the counter.

  Javier started to turn, but Turner had already reacted by raising a gun from beneath the table. Quickly he shot to the side.

  Javier turned to see that the post-owner had taken advantage of their being distracted by one of his daughter’s screams to drag a rifle up from under the counter. But before he could fire Turner’s single shot tore straight between his eyes and sent him tumbling from view, his rifle falling from his grasp.

  ‘Good shooting,’ Javier said, standing. He raised his voice. ‘Get everybody in and take what we need. We’re moving on.’

  ‘We bringing the women?’ Turner asked.

  ‘No. Pablo would have, but we have to travel fast.’

  Everyone bustled, except for Turner who paced round to stand beside him, adopting a position of being his closest confidant without having been given permission to adopt that role.

  ‘Then I have an idea,’ he said, leaning towards Javier and lowering his voice so that only he could hear. ‘Something I went back to the cage to do to Hiram Deeds.’

  ‘Go on.’

  As the first of the women was pushed back into the post, Turner pointed to a coil of rope looped over a nail on the wall.

  ‘You don’t want to be known as Pablo Rodriguez’s brother and we don’t want to be remembered as another Rodriguez gang.’ He went over to the rope and unfurled it, smirking as he looked at the cowering woman. ‘It’s time to strike fear into everyone’s hearts.’

  CHAPTER 8

  Marshal Kurt McLynn had arrived at the trading post before them.

  Shackleton Frost had hoped he wouldn’t have to meet Kurt again while he tracked down Javier Rodriguez, but Elwood had led them to a trading post where they’d found him standing outside. He was consulting with several concerned-looking men, and as they approached Shackleton considered how best to conduct what was sure to be a difficult meeting.

  But all thoughts of confrontation fled from his thoughts when he saw what Kurt and the group were talking about. Strung up behind the trading post were four dangling bodies, three being young women.

  ‘Just like at Devil’s Canyon,’ Elwood said, eyeing the women with shock and disgust narrowing his eyes. ‘Except these are women, and they’re innocent.’

  ‘Javier Rodriguez?’ Shackleton asked when he’d dismounted and joined Kurt.

  ‘Don’t know for sure,’ Kurt said, turning to him, his expression at least appearing shocked for the first time. ‘Nobody here survived, but I’m guessing he gave these women the fate he was due.’

  ‘How long ago and where did he go?’

  ‘It’s been around six hours, but I ain’t sure where he went. This is a popular post and there’s so many trails, there’s no working out which one is Javier’s.’

  ‘Then let’s hope that wherever he goes these four will satisfy his twisted desire to kill.’

  Kurt snorted a rueful laugh. ‘I ain’t confident about that. These men are already talking about the Gallows Gang. It’s my guess that as soon as Javi
er hears that and the fear that comes with it, it’ll encourage him to string more people up.’

  ‘Then we have to find him quickly.’

  ‘We?’

  Shackleton noted that this discovery had driven away some of Kurt’s arrogance. His tone was more conciliatory than before, but that didn’t stem his own anger.

  ‘You, me, either of us, it don’t matter. As long as one of us recaptures Javier Rodriguez before your incompetence lets him kill again.’

  Shackleton’s comment made Kurt’s eyes flare, but aside from snorting his breath, he provided no further sign of his anger. Perhaps, Shackleton wondered, he was now feeling guilty about the results of his failings.

  ‘How did you work out he’d come here?’ Kurt asked.

  ‘We stayed put and got some sleep.’ Shackleton considered Kurt’s tired eyes and his stooped posture. ‘A man who don’t get no sleep ain’t much use to anyone. Come daylight we went down into the canyon, but we couldn’t find the cage or any sign of survivors.’

  ‘So we’re searching for ten men?’

  ‘Eleven. We followed the sole remaining man from Pablo Rodriguez’s gang.’

  ‘What man?’

  ‘When we happened across the men lying in wait we knocked out one man, but when we returned he’d gone. Elwood picked up his trail and we followed him. It led here, and with any luck, if we can pick it up again, it’ll lead us to Javier.’

  ‘You should have told me about him,’ Kurt snapped, regaining some of his former truculence.

  ‘What good would that have done you? It wouldn’t have changed anything because you haven’t taken any of my advice … yet.’

  Kurt winced, then looked away while he took deep, calming breaths. When he spoke again his voice was low.

  ‘Don’t make me say the words, Shackleton.’

  Shackleton snorted a laugh. ‘That mean you’re admitting you need me?’

  ‘I need able men to help me.’

  ‘Then we ain’t much use to you because we won’t help you.’ Shackleton waited until Kurt opened his mouth to retort, then continued: ‘But we will search for Javier Rodriguez and put him behind the bars he should have always remained behind. If you want to help us, you can.’