with a shot of J. H. Cutter. He was not much of a day-drinker , especially when he was alone, but the whiskey boosted his sagging spirits.
Whistling, he went out and worked in the vegetable patch all afternoon, weeding, planting black-bean seeds, watering his onions, chayote squash, bell peppers, and flowering jalapeño vines. In the oven-hot sun it was hard, back-breaking work, especially lugging buckets of water up from the stream, and when he stopped at sunset he was worn out and soaked with sweat.
After cooling off in the stream he returned to the cabin and fixed a meal out of his lunch leftovers.
After supper, he lit a cigar and sat on the doorstep sipping his whiskey while watching a swarm of bats hunting insects in the darkening sky.
Dusk gradually chased away the last light. Insects whined past his ears in the darkness. A sickle moon and endless stars brightened the indigo sky. Presently, a cool breeze swept down off the Sierras. Gabriel pulled up his shirt collar and drank from the bottle. Mind drifting, he spat out a smoke-ring and idly poked a finger through it. The whiskey and a full stomach made him sleepy. His eyelids grew leaden and gradually he dozed off.
Out of nowhere Cally’s face appeared. She smiled and said something he couldn’t hear. She looked exactly as she had when he’d ridden off that night, only minutes ahead of a posse, leaving her standing in the cantina doorway, her lovely face and long autumn-gold hair glinting in the lamplight. He’d promised her that he would be back, no matter what, and she’d smiled that sad little smile of hersand waved goodbye. He had meant what he said, but like so many other outlaws on the run, his destiny was decided for him.
Gabriel’s dream was suddenly interrupted by a shrill neigh. He looked up just in time to see the Morgan burst out of the barn, already at full gallop, and charge off down the slope into the darkness.
Gabriel wondered what had startled the stallion. Ten years ago it might have been a band of hostiles after livestock , or marauding Comancheros down from west Texas, the mixture of renegade whites and liquored-up Comanches ready to rob, rape or kill anyone they came upon; but now, in the summer of ’91, those types of raids were a thing of the past. Even attacks by border trash were rare. Bandidos were all a person had to worry about these days. And generally they stayed in the mountains, ambushing travelers rather than wandering out into the open and risking a fight with the well-armed Rurales .
Still, something had frightened Brandy and Gabriel decided to investigate. Armed with his Winchester and a lamp, he crossed to the barn. Empty. Wondering if the unpredictable horse was playing games with him again, he decided to take advantage of its absence and clean out the stall. He hung the lamp on a hook, he grabbed the pitchfork and began removing the soiled straw.
At that moment the stallion returned. Gabriel heard its hoofs clatter into the barn and whirled, pitchfork raised to keep it away.
‘Get outta here!’ he yelled. ‘Y’hear me? Go on! Vamos !’
But the Morgan was already charging. It swerved past the fork, slamming into Gabriel and sending him sprawling . From the floor he saw the enraged stallion rear up, screaming, forelegs flailing, and knew his time had come.But the descending hoofs weren’t aimed at him; instead they pounded at something under the straw in the stall. Again and again the stallion stamped the straw. Then at last it stopped and stood there, snorting.
Shaken, Gabriel slowly got up and stared at the trembling stallion.
‘Whoa, easy now, fella, easy….’
He inched past the agitated horse and saw the dead sidewinder curled amongst the straw, its horned head and fat body mashed by the flailing hoofs.
‘Judas H. Priest.’ Gabriel whistled softly and looked at Brandy. The Morgan had calmed down. Realizing that he owed the horse an apology, maybe even his life, he reached out to rub the
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