The Black Jacks

McAllen grabbed the boy by the collar and carried him on down the street, walking briskly. In short order he came to an adobe wall surrounding a residence. He lifted the lad to the top of the wall.

"Get down on the other side, son, and stay there until the fracas is over."

The boy was shaking life a leaf. McAllen thought, He won't hanker so to fight Indians anymore. This would be a good lesson—assuming he survived it.

As the youth slipped out of sight down the backside of the wall, McAllen turned into an alley which would bring him to the rear of the Council House. Now he was free to look for Tice and Yancey. They were Black Jacks, which meant he would likely find them in the thick of the fighting.

But by the time he reached the Plaza de Armes, the fight was all but over. Occasional gunshots rang out on distant streets. The Council House was a scene of carnage. Comanche dead lay in heaps beneath the gray stone arches along the front of the building. It was there that he found Yancey Torrance. Yancey had a bloody knife in one hand and a smoking pistol in the other.

"I'm sorry, John Henry," he said, contrite. "I had to kill two of 'em. I know that isn't what we were sent here to do, but they come at me, bent on mayhem, so I was obliged to defend myself."

McAllen nodded. He was sorry, too. And angry.

A pair of Rangers carried Eli Wingate out of the Council House. Blood dripped from Wingate's dangling arm, leaving a crimson trail on the old stones. Tice came out, too. McAllen walked over and stopped the Rangers.

"What the hell happened in there, Wingate?" he asked.

Pale, his features wrenched with pain, Wingate glowered at him. "So much for peace. We'll have war, and I for one am glad for it. Those goddamn savages murdered my brother, and now they've cost me my arm. They'll pay, McAllen. They'll pay dearly."

"Get him over to Dr. Reynolds's," Tice told the Rangers. "I'll be along shortly."

The Rangers moved on. Tice lingered a moment with McAllen and Yancey.

"He'll lose that arm. The bone's shattered. I don't much care for the man, but I must try my best to save his life. That damned Hippocratic Oath puts me in a bind now and again." With a grim smile, the gray, disheveled physician took a look about him. "They say a man named Hunt barged into the Council House and shot that white woman the Comanches had brought with them. That's when all hell broke loose. I'd say we've got about thirty Comanche dead, maybe a dozen of our people." He shook his head. "Houston was right. I overheard someone speculating that Lamar had given John Morris instructions to take the chiefs hostage whether they brought all their white captives in or not. But if that's so, Morris didn't get the chance before the shooting started."

"A few of the Indians escaped, I think," said Yancey. "Wingate sent his Rangers out to hit their camp. He probably thinks there might be more white captives there."

"Yes," said Tice. "His little niece, perhaps."

McAllen muttered a curse under his breath. "Well, gentlemen, I have to go after those Rangers. They'll kill women and children without thinking twice, and that can only make matters worse."

"Not a good idea, John Henry," said Yancey. "What can you do—except maybe get yourself killed?"

McAllen spared him a grave look. "I won't know until I try, will I?"

Yancey sighed. "Let's go, then."

McAllen turned to Tice. "You stay and do what you can for Wingate and the other wounded."

Joshua was waiting for them at the hotel, the horses saddled and ready, and the three men hastened north on the Calle de la Soledad, following the river past the Old Mill. The sound of gunfire guided them. Reaching the crest of a grassy slope, they checked their horses. Below, the Comanche encampment was partially obscured by a pall of dust. Texas Rangers were charging through at a gallop, their Colts blazing, shooting anything that moved. The sight made McAllen sick to his stomach with helpless rage.

"Damn them," he rasped. "Don't they know what they're doing?"

Yancey glanced bleakly at the man he had followed unflinchingly from the cypress swamps of Florida to the windy plains of Texas. He knew what McAllen meant. The Comanches would never forget or forgive this day. Thirty of their chiefs had been killed, and now women and children were being exterminated. From this day forth, no one in Texas would be safe until the Comanches were utterly destroyed—and if the bands united that would be an impossible task.

"They know," replied Yancey grimly. "They just don't care."

Cold fury etched on his face, John Henry McAllen kicked Escatawpa into a gallop. The gray hunter seemed to fly down the long slope. Yancey and Joshua followed, both committed to watching their captain's back.

McAllen rode straight into the melee, without giving a thought to his safety. Directly ahead of him a mounted Ranger was riding an old man down. Before McAllen could reach him, the Ranger fired point-blank into the Indian's back. The deed done, the Ranger slowed his horse and looked around to see if he needed to expend another cartridge on the old one. The gray hunter carried McAllen past, and as he went by, McAllen reached out and got a handful of the Ranger's coat and dragged the man out of the saddle. The Ranger hit the ground so hard he was knocked unconscious.

McAllen rode on. He did not see the Comanche brave emerge from a skin lodge and, taking aim, draw back the arrow in his bow. But Joshua saw the danger, and he leaped from the saddle, carrying the Comanche to the ground before the warrior could loose the arrow. Joshua's Bowie knife rose and fell, rose and fell, dripping blood.

Up ahead, McAllen saw a young woman, carrying an infant in a papoose, dart into another tepee. A Ranger made a ru

Just as he entered the skin lodge, McAllen heard gunshots from within. Rushing in, he caught a glimpse of the woman falling. The Ranger whirled, and the grin on his face infuriated McAllen. "Bastard," he rasped, and slammed the barrel of his Colt as hard as he could into the Ranger's face. The man crumpled, blood spewing from mouth and nose. McAllen kicked him in the ribs. The Ranger moaned and flopped over on his back. Bending over the half-conscious man, McAllen put the barrel of the Colt to his head. He had never wanted to kill a man—until this moment. His finger whitened on the Colt's trigger. The Ranger stared blankly up at him.

The squall of the baby in the fallen papoose wrenched McAllen to his senses. He drew a long breath, straightened, and put the Colt under his belt. The papoose lay beneath the arm of the dead woman. McAllen gently moved the arm and picked up the papoose. The Ranger lay perfectly still, watching his every move.

"If I ever see you again," said McAllen, "I'll kill you."

He walked out of the tepee, and saw Yancey locked in a lethal wrestling match with a Comanche. Before he could go to his friend's aid, another Indian, this one mounted, came out of nowhere, bearing down on him with a war club raised and a piercing cry on his lips. McAllen recognized him as one of the young Quohadi chiefs at the Council House. This one, then, had been among the few who had managed to get out of San Antonio alive.