Dear God in heaven.The men were vaqueros; she could tell by the short jackets and flare-bottomed pants, and their low-crowned, wide-brimmed hats. But they weren’t del Robles men. Dear Lord, they must be the outlaws she had heard about—men who rode with the Spanish Dragon!
Carly’s hand shook on the cold wrought-iron latch as she eased the wooden door partially closed then peeked out through the crack. She needed to warn her uncle and the men in the bunkhouse, but once she stepped outside, the outlaws might seeher. They might shoot her before she could sound some sort of warning.
Then her eye caught the heavy metal bell.
“That’s it,” she whispered to herself, straightening her spine, working to build up her courage. The bell was used as a signal for meals, for mail, for a dozen sundry communications. It was also a warning of trouble and at this hour of the morning, no one would doubt what the ringing bell meant.
Carly checked the window to see if any of the raiders were watching the house, counted slowly to three, then jerked open the kitchen door. Bunching her nightgown in order to run left her legs bare but she hardly noticed the cold damp ground or the pebbles cutting into the bottoms of her feet.
Instead she dashed straight for the bell suspended from a stout wooden timber about twenty feet away, her long thick auburn braid flying out behind her. Carly grabbed the knotted rope and madly began to ring the bell.
***
Ramon jerked rein as the first harsh clang rent the air.“Madre de Dios,”he swore softly, his eyes searching the grounds for the source of the alarm. He spotted the small robed figure standing at the edge of the patio and knew in an instant that it was the girl.
“Andele, muchachos!Take the horses and go!”
“What about the remuda?” Andreas asked, racing up beside him, his bay horse nervously prancing. “We cannot leave without them.”
“Sanchez and Domingo are rounding them up. I will help them—you go on with the others.” But already Andreas had spun his horse toward the second corral and started in that direction. Ramon cursed but the words were lost in the raucous clanging, the shrilly neighing horses, and the shouting of themen. He spurred his horse and passed Andreas, shouted orders to Sanchez and Ruiz Domingo, then whirled the stallion toward the woman still fiercely ringing the bell.
By now lamps burned inside the thick-walled adobe hacienda and men streamed out of the bunkhouse in various states of undress, some of them carrying weapons. He wasn’t concerned with Austin’s vaqueros, since many of them were reluctant to oppose El Dragón, and most felt a certain amount of loyalty to any man of Spanish blood who opposed thegringos.But the Anglos were armed and already firing their rifles, Fletcher Austin among them.
The bell had gone silent; now the air hummed with the deadly roar of gunshots. Villegas returned fire, wounding two of Austin’s men, but a lead ball smashed into Ignacio’s arm, and Santiago’s thigh ran red with blood. The girl crouched low behind a wooden watering trough. Ramon had started to rein away from her, to head back toward his men, when he realized Andreas was riding straight for her.
“Andreas!” he shouted. “Go back!” But it was already too late. A rifle shot rang out, his brother jerked as the lead ball slammed home, then slumped forward over the saddle, his shirt red-stained with blood.
Ramon felt a wave of fury like nothing he had known. He started toward his brother, but Pedro Sanchez appeared at Andreas’s side and together they rode off toward the rear gate leading away from the rancho. He thought of the girl, of the havoc she had caused, of her cool demeanor and haughty eastern ways. In his mind, he saw his brother riding toward her, heard the deafening crack of the gun.
Ramon’s anger surged, turning to white-hot rage. Beneath him the black horse reared. He spun the stallion, dug his heels into the horse’s ribs, leaned low over the saddle, and rode hard toward the girl crouching down behind the watering trough.Lead whizzed past his ear, but he didn’t slow. She screamed when she saw him racing toward her, then stood up and began to run.
It was exactly what he wanted.
As the black horse galloped up beside her, Ramon bent forward, leaned out and slid an arm around her waist, then dragged her up over his saddle. She was screaming and fighting, trying to get away, but she was no match for him. He forced her face down across the saddle, his hand pressing hard on the small of her back. He could feel her trembling as the horse picked up speed, saw her long reddish braid dangling over the horse’s shoulder. She was afraid to move, he realized, now that the animal was running flat out, and felt a shot of grim satisfaction. He caught up with the others by the time they reached the trees, his vaqueros driving the herd relentlessly ahead of them.
They were moving with speed and efficiency, traveling the route that had been chosen well ahead. Rifle shots still echoed in the distance, but his men were already out of range. They moved a little farther into the trees, gaining distance from the rancho, riding out of danger and into the mountains that would insure their escape.
He stopped for a moment to secure the woman’s arms behind her, to bind her feet, and gag her when she tried to scream. Then he tossed her across his horse’s withers and rode on in search of his brother.
He found him slumped over the saddle, barely able to stay on his horse.
“Take the girl,” he commanded a vaquero named Enriquez, who dragged her off the stallion and over to his own horse.
The stout man loaded her face down across the saddle in front of him, then swung himself up behind her. Sanchez gave Ramon a sharp look, clearly marking his disapproval that the woman had been taken, but quickly turned back to Andreas.
“How is he?” Ramon asked, worried how seriously his brother had been hurt.
“It is very bad, my friend,” the older man said. “Very bad.”
A chill slid through him. Not just a shoulder wound as he had thought. “We cannot stop until we reach the pass. Can he make it until then?”
When Sanchez shook his head, “I do not think so,” Ramon’s worry increased tenfold.
His heart began to throb dully, forcing a tightness into his chest. He turned to Ruiz Domingo. “What about the others who are wounded?” he asked the thin-faced young vaquero. “Can they make it as far as the pass?”
“Si,Don Ramon. The others were not injured nearly so badly.”
“Ride as far as the canyon at Los Osos. There is cover there and water for the horses. Then you must separate as we planned. Martinez will take five men and head north to Sacramento City with the horses. The rest of you will wait for us at the base of the canyon. If we do not arrive by tomorrow at dawn, go on to the stronghold without us.”
