The Wild Bunch Read online

“Well, this ain’t moving us any closer to that railroad. Let’s ride.” They mounted, settled themselves in the saddles. Pike looked at Dutch. “This is the last go-round, Dutch. This time we do it right.”

  They kicked the horses into motion, rode northward steadily. The rail lines lay like a thread just above the border.

  On that thread moved their cargo of golden arms.

  • The rising sun picked glinting shafts from the brightwork of the locomotive as it rolled westward. The engine was pushing a flatcar ahead of it, towing a tender, a second flatcar, a coach and a box car. It was not a heavy train but the small locomotive was not the best and the pace was depressingly slow.

  On the flatcar in front two soldiers in new uniforms watched the track ahead for barricades or other obstructions. Two others just like them sat on the flatcar behind the tender, among the crates of weapons and ammunition. All four of them were bored with the long ride across the empty desert. There was nothing to see except broken country, ragged hills, rock piles like huge skeletons and weird cactus shapes.

  Deke Thornton and his men lounged on the wooden benches in the passenger coach behind the weapons car. They looked more than half asleep. At the back end of the coach a cluster of army recruits kept well apart from Thornton’s crew, showed no interest in them or in the scene passing outside the windows. The sergeant in charge, Frank McHale, slept, snoring loudly.

  Thornton had watched McHale through the dragging hours, thinking bitterly that when the holdup came the soldiers would be no help at all. He could count on no one except his bounty hunters. At least they had an incentive—money. The soldiers had no such carrot before them. They were here only because they had been ordered to guard the train, not for extra pay. They were obeying orders.

  His thoughts went to the box car and the horses loaded inside it. The army horses were roach-maned and unsaddled. His crew’s animals were saddled and ready for quick use. He had checked the car at the last stop and found the railroad stock handler asleep on a pile of hay, an empty jug cradled in his arms.

  Deke Thornton hunched disgustedly in his seat and cursed the army, the railroad and Harrigan. The way it shaped up he and the bounty hunters would have the whole job on their hands.

  A slight difference in the click of the wheels and a new drifting sensation told him the train was slowing. He looked out through the window, found his men equally alert. He wasted a glance on the soldiers. McHale still snored in slow, regular burbles. The others glanced out briefly, settled back.

  Thornton made a quick trip to the platform at the front of the coach, dropped down to the bottom step and leaned out. He saw a water tower ahead, a small maintenance building and station. He studied the structures and the land around them, saw no horses, wagons or people.

  Annoyed, he went back to his seat. The potential places to expect a strike were getting fewer. And where was Pike Bishop? Was he, after all, not interested in the arms shipment? Another twenty or twenty-five miles and they would know.

  And what if Thornton had overlooked another possibility—what if the bunch had been so badly mauled at San Rafael that they had not stopped in the border country but had fled on to hole up and lick their wounds farther south?

  Thornton could be on his way back to Yuma right now. A cold ball formed in his stomach. He would die rather than go through the gate of that hellhole again. With that grim thought filling his mind, Thornton felt the train stop, and, after a proper interval, he heard water spilling.

  • The locomotive had pulled up just beyond the water tower. The fireman had climbed from the cab onto the tender and, as he had a hundred times before, reached up to catch the lanyard. He had pulled the spout down and steered it to the mouth of the train’s tank. Water gurgled down the chute and the fireman straightened.

  And looked into the barrel of a sawed-off shotgun.

  He froze, blinking in surprise. Angel grinned down at him and slid gracefully down the spout onto the tender.

  Angel was sure of himself, planting his feet where he could cover both the engineer and fireman. He motioned the fireman to keep taking on water and the engineer to join them on the tender. The engineer did not argue and the fireman let the water run.

  Pike, Dutch and Lyle came in a swift rush around the corner of the maintenance shack. Pike leaped into the engine cab, Lyle raced along the catwalk at its side and jumped to the flatcar anchored against the cowcatcher. He had to whistle to make the soldiers there turn. He held them, his gun leveled, signaling that they should throw their rifles away. They tossed them aside and stood still. Dutch scrambled up to join Angel on the tender, positioned himself where he could watch both the train crew and the two soldiers on the second flatcar. Under the threat of Dutch’s gun they, too, dropped their rifles.

  The takeover went smoothly. By the time Pike had the throttle under control Angel had jumped to the ground, run along the rear flatcar and found the coupling pin between it and the coach. Pike eased the engine back. Angel pulled the pin free and Pike moved the engine ahead, breaking the train.

  • The separation caused a slight jar in the passenger coach. Thornton rolled to his feet, stood for an instant, waiting for more movement, then ran to the forward door. He saw the forward section of the train leaving, saw Angel leap to the coupling bar of the arms car.

  Thornton drew his gun, started to open the door, then turned back, waving to his men. They were ready and ran with him for the horse car.

  • The flatcars with the engine between them moved further down the track from the train. Dutch, watching from the tender, saw Thornton and his crew spilling from the coach, racing for the horse car.

  He yelled at Pike, “They’re coming. Get us out of here.”

  Lyle Gorch, covering the soldiers up front, spun at Dutch’s yell. The soldiers used the chance to dive for their rifles but did not make them. Lyle, spinning back, killed them with two bullets.

  Pike pushed the bar wide open. The locomotive labored, gaining speed as the drivers churned.

  Dutch crossed the tender, holding his gun on the soldiers on the weapons car. He kicked the engineer and the fireman into the trackside dust and went on to balance himself on the rear of the tender, closer to the soldiers.

  A sudden lurch of the train threw him over the rear, between the tender and the arms car, dumped him. He grabbed for anything that would stop his fall. One hand caught the edge of the tender, clamped on it. He kicked out. His feet found the coupling and braced against it. He hung helpless and cursing barely above the ground that raced beneath him as the train bounced over loose joints and gathered speed.

  The two soldiers snatched up their guns and ran toward Dutch. He saw their heads and used his free hand to yank the short gun from his holster. He fired blindly upward at the heads.

  The soldiers pulled back, opened fire. A bullet peeled a long splinter from the planking and nearly hit him. He ducked, hanging on for his life.

  Then he heard other shooting. Angel was on top. A bullet caught a soldier in the back, knocked him screaming off the car. The other soldier panicked. Dutch heard stumbling and banging of rifle cases. Angel’s shot found the man as he jumped over the edge. Dutch saw him hit in mid-air.

  Angel ran forward, lay down, stretched to reach Dutch, got hold of his collar and hauled him up to the car.

  The train ran on, racing now.

  Behind it the scene at the stranded cars grew smaller but seemed magnificently confused.

  • Back there Thornton cursed his men as they fought to lead their horses down the ramp, milling, having trouble mounting the frightened, plunging animals.

  “Get them out,” he yelled. “Get up. Let’s get going.”

  The jerking of the train, the shots, the shouts had finally roused Sergeant McHale. He stumbled to his feet, his bawling voice adding to the chaos.

  “Order, damn it. Corporal, get these men out of this car. Get the horses out—”

  He saw Thornton and the hunters flash past the window, whirling up a torna
do of dust.

  He bawled, “Corporal—it’s that damned Pinkerton gang in a doublecross. Get yourself mounted and ride like hell to Todos Malos—tell them that Thornton crowd robbed the train and that we are in pursuit.”

  The order made no sense to the corporal but he knew better than to argue. He ran, was the first soldier in the horse car, hoisted a saddle on his mount, dragged it down the ramp. He flung himself aboard and spurred east as hard as the animal could run.

  The sergeant clattered down the steps, threw one look up the track. He saw the tiny train far ahead and the pounding bounty hunters far behind but riding after it. He cursed the superiors to whom he had complained about Thornton’s being on this trip to begin with.

  He turned to try to howl some sense into his raw recruits. They had the horse car in a turmoil as they fumbled, stumbled over each other and spooked the horses with their shouting and clumsiness at getting the saddles on and tightened.

  They responded to his urgings by trying to crowd all together through the door.

  • Deke Thornton was riding as hard as if he were escaping rather than chasing. And in a sense he was fleeing a future in Yuma. The locomotive was more than a mile and a half ahead and he did not expect to catch it in motion. The engine with only two flatcars for drag could outstrip the best horses. But unless Pike Bishop intended to run right on in to the army base he would have to stop somewhere and head south. And it would take time to transfer the arms to wagons—and mounted men could outride any wagon team.

  • The locomotive thundered west. Pike poured on speed. He saw the trestle over the deep canyon rushing toward him and at the last moment cut the steam and locked the brakes. The wheels slid, throwing a blanket of sparks from the rails. The engine screamed to a stop on the trestle. The weapons car halted opposite the wagon road that wound down the canyon.

  He had a glimpse of Sykes as the cab rolled past. The old man was standing on the wagon seat, waving and shouting his welcome. The noise of the engine subsided. Pike heard the scrape of boxes and their thump as the crew, in a bucket line, snagged the crated guns and ammunition off the flatcar into the wagon bed.

  His bunch was thoroughly rehearsed for instant action.

  Pike did not join the bucket line. He climbed to the roof of the cab and looked east. A cloud of dust rising along the tracks marked the advance of the bounty hunters. He called a warning to the feverishly working bunch.

  “Get that stuff aboard and get out of here. We’ve got visitors.”

  He scrambled back into the cab, heard Dutch yell, “Come on. Come on. We’ve got what we want. Let’s move.”

  Pike yelled back, exhilaration of this high moment of the adventure making him laugh.

  “Right away. Soon as I return a favor.”

  He yanked the bar into reverse, felt the wheels take hold and move the engine back off the trestle. He jumped as it came abreast of the wagon. He landed on the piled gun boxes, fell heavily as his bad leg turned under him. But he had no time to consider pain.

  Sykes whipped the team down the grade of the canyon road and Pike, standing up just before they tipped over the rim, had a sight of the locomotive, backing toward the stranded cars, picking up momentum quickly with its lightened load.

  Angel had driven the riding horses ahead to the canyon mouth where it kissed a border river. The crew hurriedly lashed empty barrels along the sides of the wagon bed to buoy it for the crossing.

  By the time Sykes reached the shore Angel had the saddle horses in the river, waiting. Pike jumped to the bank and with the Gorches unhitched the team.

  Tector and Lyle swung onto the dray animals and swam them across the river. They waited there, giving the animals a breather.

  Pike and Dutch took the saddle horses from Angel, snubbed ropes from the wagon tongue around the saddle horns while Angel rode on another chore, toward the rickety bridge that spanned the river just below.

  On the wagon seat Sykes reached for the cable crossing they had previously rigged, slipped it under the hooks on the wagon side.

  • Deke Thornton, pressing his pace and his tiring animals, saw the locomotive rush back past him. He looked after it without slowing his horse. Ahead of him, where the river bent, he had a distant view of Bishop’s bunch. One rider was swimming his horse, towing other horses that in turn towed a wagon. They were in midstream. The wagon bed slewed with the current but still moved across the water. It was obviously kept from being swept away by a cable fastening.

  The distance was much too great for a rifle shot. His vicious curse blended with a shuddering crash from behind as the locomotive plowed into the standing coach.

  He turned in time to see the coach overturn. From what he could see, most of the animals and soldiers were in the clear. They milled.

  Thornton kept his own animal in full gallop while he continued to look back. He picked out a figure he thought was McHale, riding, gesticulating what was probably orders. These presently seemed to have the effect of ending the chaos. McHale lined up his men, wheeled them to ride after Thornton.

  • Slowly, answering the tow ropes, the wagon floated across, kept by the cable from swinging too far downstream. When its wheels struck the shelving bottom of the far side and bogged there, the Gorches brought in the team, fastened the traces again to the singletree and Sykes swung his whip, shouting the animals into their collars.

  The beasts pawed for footing, lunged at the bank but the wagon did not move. Pike, wet to the waist, dug in his spurs, flailed his hat at the horses tied to the tongue. Sykes cursed and lashed the rumps of the team.

  The wagon moved a little, settled back.

  Angel, at the Mexican end of the rickety bridge, made no move to join the effort. He took a cigar from his pocket, lit it and stood drawing it into a steady glow.

  A shot slammed across Sykes’ high yelling. No one seemed hit but the bunch spun to look across the river. Thornton and the bounty hunters were in sight, pelting down the canyon road.

  Dutch, on the wagon with Sykes, raised his rifle and shot a horse out from under its rider. The horse went down, rolled. A second horse fell over it, throwing both riders wide.

  Pike shouted at Tector and Lyle. They ran into the water, each toward a rear wheel, caught a spoke and their muscles knotted, lifting.

  Dutch’s rifle was whipping steadily. He made one hit, saw the man throw his hands wide and pitch from the saddle. He fired and tallied again. The bounty hunters, at a disadvantage on the running horses, swerved and drove for cover.

  Pike saw Angel squatting quietly in the brush just under the edge of the bridge. Angel puffed on his cigar, holding the ends of three fuses like reins between his fingers, watching the north shore patiently.

  Below him the wagon had finally broken loose from the dragging mud, was up on the dry bank, moving higher, into the road that wound through a rising gully thick with brush.

  Dutch continued firing across at the bounty hunters, now dismounted, crouching. Tector and Lyle ran along the wagon, jumped to their horses, flipped the tow ropes from their saddle horns and rode out of the way of the lunging team. Pike flipped his and Angel’s ropes loose, pulled aside and tied Angel’s mount to a tree and then sat quietly, looking back.

  Deke Thornton was still mounted, Pike saw him head his horse toward the narrow, swaying bridge and raised his rifle. He decided that the distance was too great for an effective shot and waited.

  Angel, too, was watching Thornton put his horse at the bridge. He saw the animal shy and refuse the crossing, saw Thornton whirl back. An instant later Pike heard the crack of a new rifle from the trees on the hogback above the canyon road. It was followed by others and Pike turned to stare. His eyes widened on the hillside above Thornton where uniformed riders were dropping off their horses, kneeling, firing down the bank. Thornton’s men saw them, too, reversed their attention from the disappearing wagon and fired uphill.

  Thornton yelled. His words were drowned in the racket of angry guns. The bounty hunters held their
ground for a scant minute. The army fire was growing heavy. Thornton gestured his men back into saddle and rode toward the bridge.

  Thornton, swearing, forced his horse onto the thin planking. His men followed.

  Pike saw Angel smile, grind the red coal of his cigar against the fuse ends, lay them gently on the ground. Thornton’s horse was prancing, picking its footing on the bridge, its neck bowed, trying to hold back. The crew crowded after him. The slender cables groaned and the planking sagged under the combined weight.

  Angel ran toward his horse and spurred toward the bunch. Pike started after the wagon.

  It had climbed the rim of the gully and dipped over it, out of sight. Dutch and the Gorch brothers rode behind it. Pike stopped on the crest, looked back at Thornton in the middle of the bridge and raised his hat in salute.

  He was in time to see the dynamite blow at the near end, throw the bridge timbers apart like straws, drop the planking at a crazy cant held only by the straining cable.

  Thornton and the men with him pitched over the side and men and kicking horses plunged into the water.

  The second charge went off in the middle. The cables snapped and the bridge snaked down. The third explosion threw debris in a vicious flowering over those bounty hunters who had chosen to swim their animals in their haste to escape the fire from the soldiers who were supposed to be supporting them.

  Chaos was the fruit of the flower. Men and horses struggled in a tangle in water turned crimson by blood. Pike sat his animal quietly on the ridge, watching the red tide and the floating forms swirl into the current, speed downstream.

  His face was immobile. His lips were tight. His eyes were unguardedly sad.

  Angel sparkled with bright life. He laughed as he reached Pike. They had the guns, the ammunition. His village would soon be armed.

  • The soldiers on the slope above the bridge stared, dumbfounded by the explosions, confused by the evidence of their eyes. McHale’s shouted order sent them down to capture the few bounty hunters wounded and clinging to the brush of the river bank.