Part 17 (1/2)

One evening at dinner, Mrs. Munzenberger asked me, ”Have you ever, perchance, been in Coahuila?”

”Yes,” I answered, ”I spent several weeks in the State last Winter.”

”And how did you like it?” she asked.

”Well, I must say I found rather too many thrills there for comfort,” I replied. And when I mentioned affair on the sierra south of Musquiz, she broke in with:

”Indeed! And you are the crazy gringo Don Abran tried to stop from going into the desert! We heard of it; in fact, it was the talk of the town, and no one expected you would ever get back. And by the way, it was a contraband _conducta_ owned by friends of ours who attacked you back of the town! Droll, is it not?”

”Perhaps--now,” I doubtfully answered.

”Yes,” Mrs. Munzenberger continued, ”they were on their way to Monclova. The night before the attack, the wife of the owner (one of the leading merchants of the town) took me to their camp in the brush near town to see their goods; and a lovely lot of American things they had.”

”But why did they attack us?” I queried.

”Well, you see, it was this way,” she explained. ”The smugglers broke camp long before dawn, and started south over the same trail by which you were approaching; they wanted to get over the summit before the Lipans or guards were likely to be stirring, for it was a point at which _conductas_ were often attacked. But shortly after sunrise, and just as they advance guard reached the summit, they discovered your party ascending, and, mistaking your uniformed soldiers for guardias, the leader lined a dozen of his men along the ridge, and opened on you, while his _mayordomo_ rushed the pack mules of the _conducta_ back down the trail they had come. Early in the fight they discovered you wore a party of _gringos_, and not guards, and decamped as soon as their _conducta_ had time to reach a point where they could leave the rail.

”Had their goods not been at stake, they would have wiped you out, if they could, for the leader's brother got shot in the head of which he died the same day. Indeed, when the two men you left behind started to leave the country, he had planned to follow and kill them, but luckily Don Abran heard of it, and restrained him.”

And this explained the mystery why they had not flanked us!

Brave to downright rashness, George Thornton lasted only about two years longer.

The Winter of 1883-84 he spent with me on my Pecos Ranch. Early in the Spring he came to me and said:

”Old man, if you want to do me a favor, get me an appointment as Deputy United States Marshal in the Indian Territory. I'm going to quit you, anyway. My guns are getting rusty. It's too slow for me here.”

”Why, George,” I replied, ”if you are bound to die why don't you blow your brains out yourself?”--for at the time few new marshals in the Indian Territory survived the first year of their appointment.

”Never mind about me,” he answered; ”I'll take care of George. Anyway, I'd rather get leaded there than rust here.”

So I got him the appointment.

A few months later, when the Territory was thrown open to settlement, Thornton homesteaded one hundred and sixty acres of land which early became a town site, and now is the business centre of the city of Guthrie. Had he lived and retained possession of his homestead, it would have made him a millionaire. But greedy speculators soon started a contest of his t.i.tle.

While this contest was at its height, one day Thornton learned some Indians living a few miles from the town were selling whiskey, contrary to Federal law. As he was mounting for the raid, having intended to go alone, a man he scarcely knew offered to accompany him, and Thornton finally deputized him.

The story of his end was told by the Indians themselves, who later were captured by a large force of marshals, and tried for his murder. They said that just at dusk they saw two hors.e.m.e.n approaching. Presently they recognized Marshal Thornton and at once opened fire on him, eight of them, from behind the little grove of cottonwoods in which they were camped. Immediately Thornton s.h.i.+fted his bridle to his teeth, and charged them straight, firing with his two ”.41” Colts. The moment he charged, his companion dodged into a clump of timber, where they saw him dismount. On came Thornton straight into their fire shooting with deadly accuracy, killing two of their number, and wounding another before he fell.

Presently, at the flash of a rifle from the brush where his companion had dismounted, Thornton pitched from his horse dead. They had done their best to kill him, they frankly swore, but it was his own deputy's shot that laid him low.

All the collateral circ.u.mstantial evidence so fully corroborated this that the Indians were acquitted. The shot that killed him hit him in the back of the head and was of a calibre different from that of the Indians' guns; and his deputy never returned to Guthrie.

That it was a murder prearranged by some of the greedy contestants for his land, was further proved by the fact that every sc.r.a.p of his private papers was found to have disappeared, and, through their loss, his family lost the homestead.

Curly's end is another story. Happily he was spared to me some years.

CHAPTER X

THE THREE-LEGGED DOE AND THE BLIND BUCK

We had just pulled the canoe out of the water and turned it over after a wet day in the bush across Giant's Lake, and were drying ourselves before the camp-fire, when Con taught a lesson and perpetrated a confidence.

His keen, shrewd eyes twinkling, and a broad smile shortening his long, lean face till its great Roman nose and pointed chin were hobn.o.bbing sociably together, the best hunter and guide on the Gatineau sat pouring boiling water through the barrel and into the innermost holy of holies of the intricate lock mechanism of his .303 Winchester--_to dry it out and prevent rusting_ from the wetting it had received in the bush.