Read Online A Noose for the Desperado by Clifton Adams - Free Book Online

lay under his pale horse with his insides shot out by a dozen rifles,
and two members of Basset's army were fighting over his fancy pistol.
    I don't know how long it went on. I remember dropping behind a dead
horse to reload, and when I stood up again there were no brown faces to
shoot at. Whitish, gagging gun smoke swirled around the figures of the
men still standing. Occasionally a moan would go up, or a curse, or
maybe a prayer in Spanish. A pistol would explode to startle the sudden
quiet, and the Mexican voice would be stilled.
    “Jesus!” a voice said. “What did you have to shoot him in the gut
for? That was a solid silver belt buckle, and look at it now!”
    I went over to a rock and sat down. For a minute I thought I was
going to be sick.
    Bama came up from somewhere and sat beside me. Pistols were still
exploding every minute or so as wounded horses or Mexicans were
discovered and killed.
    “I wonder,” Bama said flatly, “what General Sherman would have to say
about our little war here today.”
    I didn't say anything. The men were cutting the aparejos open,
laughing and gibbering and shoving as clank-streams of adobe dollars
poured into the dust. I didn't know how much money there was, but I had
never seen so much silver before. Twenty thousand dollars, maybe, It
looked like that much.
    But I was sick, and the thought of money didn't help. The ground was
littered with the dead. I had never seen so many dead men before. They
lay sprawled in crazy ragdoll positions, smugglers and bandits alike,
and the horses, and the gray little mules with the bells around their
necks.
    “I've seen what they call major battles,” Bama said, “without that
many men getting killed.” He stared blankly at nothing. He rubbed his
hands over his face, through his hair. At last he got up.
    “Where are you going?”
    “To find my horse.”
    Now I knew why Bama had saved that half bottle of whisky.

Chapter Four
    IN THE HOTTEST PART of the afternoon we started back for Ocotillo,
what was left of us. Kreyler and the Indian had gathered the silver
together and loaded it on pack horses that we had brought along for
that purpose. There were several riderless horses, but I didn't take
the trouble to count and see how many men we had left back there in the
canyon. I guess nobody did. I made the mistake once of looking back,
and already the vultures that Bama had talked about were beginning to
circle over the battleground. It took everything I had to keep my
stomach out of my throat. I didn't look back again.
    Bama had finished the rest of his whisky and was riding slouched,
chin on chest, deep in some bleary, alcoholic dream. I tried to keep my
mind away from the battle, but I kept seeing those brown, grinning
faces as they fell away in front of my guns. I wanted to think of my
cut of that silver. I tried to remember that killing was necessary
sometimes to save yourself—and that silver would save me.
    Somehow, we got back to Ocotillo. We split up again when we came to
the meeting place, and Bama and I rode back into town the same way we
had left it. It was a long ride. Bama still didn't say anything.
    It was almost dark by the time I got my horse put away. I went up to
my room and fell on the mattress in front of the door. I was dog tired.
Every muscle in my body screamed for rest, and every nerve was ready to
snap. Then I turned loose with everything I had. I vomited until my
guts were sore and there wasn't anything left in me to come up, but
still I kept gagging.
    When it was over I was soaked in sweat and shaking like a whipped
dog. It was all I could do to get off the floor and pour some water in
the bowl and wash my face.
    It was then that I felt the draft float over the back of my neck and
I knew that the door was open and somebody was standing there. I think
I knew who it was before I looked up. Sure enough, it was Marta.
    “What do you want?”
    “I think you need Marta.”
    “I