Houston Attack Page 6

  “Jeb was just provin’ to this stranger that a one-armed man ain’t worth a shit.” Quirt Evans laughed.

  Jeb was hanging on to the wooden fence, trying hard not to fall. His face and shirt were soaked with blood, and he looked as if he were about to vomit.

  The man on the porch looked from Hawker to Jeb, and then back to Hawker. “You got any particular reason for being on Sister Star property, mister?”

  “Looking for work,” Hawker said, trying to shake some of the pain out of his left hand. “Saw the ranch and just stopped by.”

  The man stepped down off the porch and stopped at a point midway between Hawker and the bloodied cowboy. He looked pointedly at Jeb. “That big mouth of yours finally got you into trouble, huh, Jeb?” He dropped his cigarette in the sand and ground it out with his foot. “Go to the bunkhouse and get cleaned up. I always had the feeling you were nothing but mouth and pussy. Pack your gear while you’re at it, and get the hell off this ranch.”

  Jeb straightened immediately. “Hell, Mr. Dalton, I got bills to pay. I just bought me that new truck, and that Appaloosa roper ain’t paid for yet—”

  “I don’t give a goddamn about your financial problems, Jeb. I told you to get, and I mean just that—”

  “Maybe you ought to check with Mr. Williams before you go firing an old hand, Mr. Dalton,” Jeb said in a tone that clearly had a double meaning. “With what I know about this operation, he might not be in such a hurry to cut me loose.”

  The man Hawker assumed to be Roy Dalton, the ranch manager, took a step toward the huge cowboy. His voice was calm, but there was a deadly undercurrent in his tone. “Remember what I said about that big mouth of yours, Jeb. And that busted nose ain’t nothing compared to the kind of trouble we can give you.”

  Jeb’s manner changed immediately. Hawker knew raw fear when he saw it, and that is exactly what the cowboy’s face now showed. “I’m … I’m sorry, Mr. Dalton. I shouldn’t have said what I did. I wasn’t thinkin’. I’ll get my stuff. I’ll clear out. I got no grudges against you or Mr. Williams.”

  Roy Dalton stared at him and said nothing. After a moment of the ranch manager’s withering silence, Jeb turned and walked quickly toward the long wooden bunkhouse.

  When he disappeared through the door, Dalton turned to Hawker. “We’re not hiring right now, mister,” he said. “And do yourself a favor. Never step on Sister Star property again uninvited. Not all of these boys are as soft as Jeb there.”

  “Any kind of work’s okay with me, Mr. Dalton,” Hawker said quickly. “I’m reliable. I don’t drink much. And if Jeb there is leaving—”

  Dalton’s eyes studied him carefully. Hawker felt as if he were a steer or a quarter horse being sized up. “What’s your name?”

  Hawker told him.

  “Where are you from?”

  “Around. I was born in Chicago, but I’ve been down in Mexico for a while.”

  Dalton nodded and said nothing. “You got trouble with the law?”

  Hawker sensed that Dalton hoped he had. He took a chance. “Some. Nothing serious. I’m no thief. You don’t have to worry about that.”

  Dalton nodded again, and Hawker knew that the lie had paid off. Dalton said, “Jeb there had his bad points, but he was a good man with a rope. You done much wrangling?”

  Hawker knew that cowboy experience was something he couldn’t lie about. These men were pros, and they would find him out in a minute. He said, “To tell you the truth, I ain’t worth a damn on a horse, Mr. Dalton. I need the work, but I can’t steer you wrong there.”

  Behind him, the other men laughed. Quirt Evans put in, “Weren’t you saying something the other day about needing a cook, Mr. Dalton? That Vietnamese boy you got now can’t make nothing that ain’t got roots and noodles and shit in it.” The other men laughed again, agreeing.

  Dalton lighted another cigarette. “What about it, Hawker? Can you cook?”

  “When a man loses an arm, Mr. Dalton, cooking’s the second thing he learns how to do.”

  Dalton eyed him narrowly. “Yeah? What’s the first?”

  “Fight.”

  Dalton turned and walked away. Over his shoulder he said, “Quirt will show you where to bunk, Hawker. We eat breakfast here at five A.M. sharp. The Vietnamese boy will show you around the kitchen.” He stopped suddenly and looked at Hawker. “And one more thing: We don’t like trouble around here. But when we do have trouble, we take care of it ourselves. Jeb there got off easy. Usually we just kill troublemakers and feed them to the dogs.”

  The other men didn’t laugh this time.

  And Hawker knew Roy Dalton wasn’t kidding.

  nine

  For the first three days Hawker kept a low profile. He kept his ears open and said little.

  In those three days he neither saw Skate Williams nor picked up any clues to the whereabouts of Cristoba de Abella.

  But he did learn a good deal about the operation of the ranch. Skate Williams owned one of the largest farm/oil operations in the world. His Texas spread consisted of eighty square miles of land—more than fifty thousand acres.

  On the property were six ranches—not four as he had first guessed. Ranch #4 where Hawker worked was exclusively a cattle ranch. It seemed to explain the near absence of Mexican slave laborers.

  But three of the ranches were operated as a millet and hy-gear farm; a cotton farm; and one that apparently was some kind of experimental station to test exotic crops that Williams hoped to someday grow commercially. On these farms Hawker was sure he would find the slaves.

  The fifth ranch was the center of the oil operation. And Ranch #1, as Hawker had suspected, was Skate Williams’s home. From the talk Hawker heard around the bunkhouse Ranch #1 had every conceivable modern nicety, including a fully equipped airport for his helicopters and Learjets, an indoor Olympic-size swimming pool, and a private rodeo stadium.

  Reading between the lines and the smirks, Hawker also gathered that Williams had his own small army dedicated to more than just internal security. It seemed that Williams was a zealot on the subject of the inevitable collapse of world society. And when the collapse came, according to some of the cowboys in the bunk-house, Williams was not only prepared to defend himself but also to take control and rebuild as well.

  They treated it like some kind of joke, but from what Hawker heard, Williams had collected enough armaments to qualify as a world nation. Not only that, he had sufficient natural resources on his own property to make such a wild notion actually feasible. He had grain, meat, water, and oil.

  These resources were the platforms of near-monopolies that Williams controlled. A chain of gas stations. A chain of feed stores. And, with the beef, the Rio Bravo Burger franchises that Hawker had grown so fond of in Houston.

  Hawker also learned that there were three kinds of employees in the Sister Star orbit: the field help; the outsiders; and, finally, the insiders.

  The source of the field help was obvious—but only to Hawker. The cowboys assumed they were mostly wetbacks, content to be fed and housed by their employer.

  Only Hawker seemed to know that they were actually slaves. And suddenly it made sense. Considering the private nature of Williams’s passion—arming himself for the final world war and the chaos that would follow—only slaves could be trusted to work around the place. Only slaves could be depended on to stay, live, work, and die within the narrow confines of the ranch.

  Hawker was relieved to realize that the wranglers in the bunkhouse were outsiders—nothing more than trusted hired help. They were paid for their special skills but not allowed into the inner sanctum. What they knew of Williams’s strange operation they learned from what they heard and what they saw.

  Hawker was relieved because he liked the men he worked with—especially Quirt Evans, the rangy cowboy who had stopped Jeb from shooting him that very first day.

  Even so, Hawker never let his guard down. Skate Williams was obviously a brilliant organizer, and certainly no fool. Hawker rem
embered all too well how the plant on the slave truck had almost gotten him killed.

  He trusted no one.

  On the fourth night Hawker decided it was time for a surveillance mission. His better judgment told him he should wait longer before venturing out, but the memory of how he had promised Cristoba de Abella his protection was too strong.

  He had to find her, and he had to find her soon. If another week went by she might be hopelessly hooked on the drugs they were pouring into her—if she wasn’t hooked already.

  It was a Friday night—the other ranch hands’ night off. Hawker finished his chores in the kitchen, instructed the Vietnamese man to finish the cleaning, and headed toward the bunkhouse.

  The bunkhouse was a long, low building with a wooden floor. Army-type bunks were alternated from wall to wall with gray lockers. There were two doors, and mounted over each was a set of steer horns.

  Hawker’s bunk was at the far end, away from the community showers. From the first, his disguise as a one-armed man had made it necessary to bathe and change clothes only when the bunkhouse was empty.

  It was not empty now.

  Quirt Evans was lying on his bunk. He wore jeans, and his boots were covered with red dust. When Hawker came in, he looked up from the magazine he was reading: Western Horseman.

  “All done for the night, Hawk?” Evans placed the magazine on his chest. His hat and gun belt hung on a wooden peg above his bed. “You ain’t half-bad in the kitchen, boy. Chow’s been pretty good since you got here.”

  Hawker smiled. All he had actually done in the kitchen was stop the Vietnamese cook, Chang Du, from using bean sprouts.

  “Thanks, Quirt. To tell you the truth, I really hadn’t done much cooking before I got here.”

  The lanky man laughed. “I know.”

  There was something about the way he said it that made Hawker uncomfortable. “Yeah? You a mind reader or something?”

  Evans laughed again and laid back on his bunk with the magazine. “Maybe, Hawk. You never know.”

  Hawker made a show of going through his duffel, as if seeking clean clothes. Actually he had hoped to shower before heading out. Now he couldn’t.

  “The other boys went into town for a beer,” Quirt Evans said. “Want to go?”

  Hawker shook his head. He smiled. “Naw. I’m just going to get into my pickup truck and drive. Do me good to get away for a while.”

  Evans raised his eyebrows, peering over the magazine. “Just make sure you don’t get lost and end up over at Skate Williams’s place. Ol’ Skate doesn’t take kindly to surprise visitors.”

  “You know him?”

  “Talked to the man maybe twice; seen him less than a dozen times. I used to ride the rodeo. Won a fair share of belt buckles, and he invited me down to one of his private rodeos. Ol’ Skate musta liked something I did, ’cause he singled me out and offered me either one of two jobs. The one I chose was this one: sometimes trail boss, sometimes cow hunter.” He folded the magazine, and the light from the overhead lamp glistened off the craggy face and blue eyes. “My ma died when I was twelve, and I never did know my pa. He was supposed to be some kind of millionaire oil man from Dallas. If he was, we never saw any of it—the money, I mean. So, what with following the rodeo, I never did have a place to really call home.” He shrugged and smiled. “So this kind of suits me fine.”

  “What was the other job he offered you, Quirt?”

  The smile broadened. “Sheriff of Star County.”

  “So Williams really does own the county?”

  “Lock, stock, and flush toilet. That’s why I told you not to get caught on his place.” His eyes grew shrewd. “Of course, in a jaw-to-jaw between you and Skate’s army, I’m not sure who I’d bet on.”

  Once again Hawker had the impression that Quirt Evans was toying with him, suggesting he knew a hell of a lot more than he’d come right out and say. For a moment Hawker considered telling him to lay it on the line. But then he decided it was no time for a confrontation; however unlikely it seemed to Hawker, there was a chance that Evans was one of Skate Williams’s plants.

  “I keep hearing about this army Williams has. What about it, Quirt? Doesn’t that seem a little weird to you?”

  The man shrugged. “You ain’t been in Texas long if you think that’s weird. Hell, half the millionaires in this state have protection organizations that would do the Marines and the CIA proud. Most of them are just tough old boys who got lucky in the oil fields, Hawk. They may act rich, but they still think poor. Most of them got the idea everyone’s out to rob what they got.” The man grinned and stretched, yawning. “I guess it’s true ol’ Skate’s gone a little overboard—they say he’s got guns up to the house that can shoot down planes. Big planes. Maybe he just figures he had to work his ass off to get what he got, and now he’s being damn careful he hangs on to it. That’s why they call him ‘Skate,’ you know. Boys say they call him that ’cause when he was a young Tom, he had to skate through a ton of shit to pull himself out of the country slums.”

  “Yeah? What’s his real first name?”

  Quirt shrugged. “You’ll have to ask someone who knows him better than me.”

  Trying not to act too interested, Hawker shrugged. “Well, I don’t care what the man does—as long as he pays me my wages on time.”

  As Hawker turned to go Evans called after him, “Hey, Hawk?”

  “Yeah?”

  “If you’re after a cold beer, you’ll find the boys in Pearsall. If you’re after something else, drive right on into San Antone. There’s a house there called Flora and Ella’s. Price up front will seem steep, but it’ll save you money on penicillin later.”

  Hawker laughed in spite of his suspicions. “Thanks for the advice, Quirt. Flora and Ella’s. I’ll remember.”

  The moment Hawker started his pickup truck, Quirt Evans tossed down the magazine he was reading, strapped on his gun belt) then went outside to saddle his horse.…

  ten

  In the mess hall of Ranch #4 there was a glossy wooden map showing all of Skate Williams’s holdings.

  Hawker had memorized the map and then resketched it in private.

  As he bounced down the rutted south Texas road, he switched on the dome light and studied his sketch. The five secondary ranches were like spokes on a wheel, all orbiting around Ranch #1, Skate Williams’s home.

  It made it very hard to sneak down the long road that led only to Ranch #1—and no doubt it was planned that way.

  Hawker wrestled with the problem as he drove. Finally he hit upon a likely solution. He slowed at the turnoff, then drove on past. He had hoped to find an abandoned barn in which to hide his truck, but there was none. He finally had to settle for a thick stand of sycamores by the shallow river, which flowed down out of the hills.

  He got out of the truck. It was a still Texas night with blazing stars and a full moon.

  Hawker could smell the fresh musk of the river as it burpled over stones.

  Hawker jumped into the open bed of the truck. In the back of the truck he had had a Houston mechanic weld an oversize tool chest to the wall of the cab. The steel lid was padlocked shut, and now Hawker opened the lock.

  Inside was the weaponry Jake Hayes had sent from Chicago. The one thing Hawker wasn’t able to hide in the tool chest was his computer.

  He wished he had it now—he would have run a check on Quirt Evans.

  Hawker took what he thought he might need from the chest: an automatic weapon (with plenty of ammunition this time); a little Walther PPK automatic; a new Cold Commander automatic rifle in place of his customized Colt Commander, which he had lost in Mexico; his Randall knife; several spider-size listening transmitters; a rope with a grappling hook; wire cutters; three different varieties of state-of-the-art explosives; and several grenades.

  He couldn’t be sure that he would need any of it. In fact, he hoped he wouldn’t. But, if he did need it he wanted it ready.

  He packed the equipment carefully in a canvas
knapsack, then sealed the chest again with the padlock.

  Finally he opened the truck’s hood and loosened a wire on the distributor cap. When he was sure the truck would not start, he left the hood open and headed off down the dirt road to Skate Williams’s ranch.

  For the first mile he stuck to the middle of the road. After all, he had a reasonable explanation for being where he was: His truck wouldn’t start. But then, far ahead, he saw the sharp blue haze of mercury lights over what had to be a security gate.

  Now he could no longer play the role of the one-armed man seeking help for his broken-down truck. Not if he was to find out what he needed to know.

  Hawker tossed his cowboy hat into the ditch and stripped off the serape. He removed the chest guard and freed his right arm. Having his arm strapped to his chest all day was sheer misery, and it felt good to be able to move it again.

  Hawker rolled the props of his disguise into the serape and hid it all in a clump of mesquite. To mark the area so he could find it quickly, he took out his Randall knife and cut two thin slashes on the backside of the fence post nearest the cache.

  Finally he pulled on a black wool watch cap to keep the moon from reflecting off his red-brown hair, then he climbed the fence and set off across the pasture toward the Williams mansion.

  It was his hope to be able to get an idea of just how well equipped and organized Skate Williams’s so-called “army” really was. Also, he wanted to try to spot the slave houses and, if the opportunity presented itself, to make contact with one of the slaves and find out where they were keeping Cristoba de Abella.

  But, more than anything else, he didn’t want to get caught.

  To get caught meant death. But, worse, it meant failure.

  Hawker moved toward the security gate, parallel to the road and the fence.

  Steers in the pasture were dark silhouettes that moved past him with a ghostly grace. The air smelled of fresh manure and the peppery odor of mesquite.