Chapter 5 Bart Enters the Scene
Bret propped the canteen under the trickle of water and drifted off to an uneasy sleep. Finally, he got up to do some more prowling around. Easing over to the boulder, he had a notion he'd like to see what lay on the other side of the big rock, but it had few handholds, and his arms gave way each time he tried to climb it.
With blind fingers, he hauled out smaller stones above the rock and thrust them aside, making the air vent wider. Afterward, he piled the discarded rocks into a type of cairn, and at last, with bleeding fingers, stood on top and gazed through the crack into the room on the other side. He couldn't see the sunlight, so it was doubtful if the other room led to the outside.
Trying to squeeze through the vent was a hopeless task. He lobbed some more rocks from around the stone to the floor to widen the vent, but when he heard the plank barring the cell door being lifted, he hurried back to his old position next to the trickle of water, hoping no one spotted his pile of rocks.
The iron door swung outward and a light entered. Food was left where the Troopers lay, both now deeply asleep. They might even have been dying. Maverick hadn't been able to raise a peep out of them in quite a while. His old canteen was replaced with another and he was given a hunk of bread. He looked up at the bounty-giver and begged for the light.
"Leave it for tonight, okay?"
The cowboy set the lantern down on a flat rock and left, clanging the door to and dropping the iron bar in place. By its light, Bret was able to see where the troopers lay. He stood up, flexing his legs a bit. Moving over to them, he spoke softly.
"Cpl. Anders?" he asked, raising the lantern high enough to make sure who was who now that he could see their faces.
Anders nodded, waking up groggy and disoriented, blinking at Maverick's lantern. Bret set it aside. A new canteen had been left for them, too. The gambler unscrewed its top and gave each man a drink, then he set it close to Anders, who was the more alert of the two.
"Is there another way out?" Anders asked. "I heard you moving about a lot."
"There's a big rock over there, and there's a room behind it. Travers blasted the cavern in two with dynamite and left a little air vent, is all."
"Does the other room go outside?"
Maverick hated to be the bearer of bad news, but said, "It doesn't seem to. At least not from what I can see of it. There's no light. I've got to get back to work."
He took off, leaving the lantern to keep the troopers company, but by its 'glow' he was able to get back to the boulder. Over the next hour, balancing on his rock pile and sometimes having to climb down to shore it up again, Bret used a rock hammer to bang out chunks of stone in the ceiling above the air vent, trying to make it bigger. Halfway through the work, he felt a hand at his elbow and jerked.
"Can you use my help?" asked Cpl. Anders. "Thanks to you, I'm a mite better."
Maverick reached over and clapped him on the back. "Grateful, Anders. But I don't think the two of us can fit up here."
"Are you making any headway at all?"
"Some. It'd be easier if I didn't have all this rock dust in my eyes."
"Come down, and I'll take over."
"You're too wobbly to stand up here. Maybe I'll get my canteen. You see it by the wall?"
"Yes, I'll get it." Anders squinted in the lantern's feeble glow, crept over to Bret's water wall, and returned with his canteen. He unscrewed the cap and handed it up to him. Once Bret took a swig, he handed it back.
"Let me try. Come down," Anders said again.
Maverick sighed. "Persistent cuss, aren't you?" He knew he had to have a break. His upper arms and neck were killing him. "Alright, but if you get tired, let me know. There isn't much we can do with this. Rock's too hard."
The weary trooper chuckled. "I noticed. For the first few days, we tried a tunnel. That was a hoot! If we'd had dynamite…"
"That's what caused this boulder to fall in the first place!" Maverick stepped down using Anders' hand for support.
"You know, I'm not as big as you," said Anders, who was as tall as Bret, but slimmer. "Maybe I could try to squeeze through the vent?"
"You can try. I'll help you up."
Climbing Maverick's rock pile, Anders took it slow and easy, while Maverick held onto his left side to give him support. Anders stuck his face into the vent as far as he could, stretching his torso upward, but he saw only darkness on the other side.
"I can feel cool air," he said. "Pass up the lantern, Bret."
Maverick obliged. In a shaky hand that almost extinguished the flame and doubled Bret's worry, Anders took the lantern and raised it to the level where his face had been, pushing it into the vent a bit.
"Here, take this. I'm comin' down."
He handed back the lantern. Maverick caught it before it crashed to the floor in Anders' uncertain grip, then with his help, Anders descended the rock cairn. When he was on the floor of the cave again, his voice quavery with exertion, he described in more detail what he'd seen through the vent opening, finishing with, "I don't think we can get through it."
"You gave it your best shot. Take a rest now, Anders. You need it."
Anders walked unsteadily over to his companion, sitting down, dejected and exhausted, his hands clasped over his drawn-up knees. Pvt. Holmes stirred in his sleep and Anders shushed him as softly as his mama would if he was at home, Maverick thought, regarding the two.
He took his own spot at the water wall again and propped up the canteen under it once more to fill up. Turning the lantern down to save coal oil, he was concerned they'd been forgotten as no one came that night to check on them. However, even with all his worries, he slept soundly.
'Morning' came and he turned up the lantern. The sharp 'rock' smell all around him—dry, and rank as old leaves—put a powerful hunger in his belly. He tore his bread in half and ate it. Checking with Anders, he learned that he and Holmes had finished off their food—without consideration for tomorrow.
Taking a swig of water, Bret started to prop his canteen up against the wall again, but he must have moved in his sleep because he couldn't find the trickle, even in the lantern light. Maddened, he scoured the wall with his fingers, then a pea-sized drop of water hit his wrist and he thought he had found gold. The trickle had moved in the night, not him.
Later on, the cowboys brought fresh canteens and as usual took back the old ones. There was more bread, too, but to Maverick's dismay, they carried the lantern out with them. With its going, all was pitch-black again. No one said a word about Maverick's pile of rocks next to the boulder. Maybe they hadn't noticed it.
That day, too, Pvt. Holmes died. Both Maverick and Cpl. Anders—Pete Anders—wept over him and recited a Bible passage. They didn't know it by heart, but both men agreed that some of its words were, "Whatever you do to the least of these, you do for me."
Now Travers had not only rustling to answer for, but out-and-out murder as well!
He'd been blind for two days, along with Anders. Two more canteens, a bit of bread. Pvt. Holmes' body was removed from the cave and Maverick could only hope he was given a decent burial. He thought about his and Anders' situation. Both knew far too much about Travers' operations here on the Verde. Would he just let them go the way of Holmes, to die of natural causes shut up in a cave, to be rid of the danger they posed?
Maverick couldn't know that his brother Bart had ridden from Flagstaff to Camp Verde. In Yuma over a month ago, Bret had telegraphed him that he'd be coming through Camp Verde on his way to Flagstaff, so Bart had started his search there.
But as Bart could find no trace or glean any word of him in Camp Verde, he rode about a hundred miles further south to Fort McDowell, camping along the way and keeping an eye out for Bret's sorrel, Ollie.
At the fort, Col. Joshua Holmes directed him northwest again to Travers' ranch to hook up with Lt. Crandall and his patrol, which had been sent out to find Holmes' nephew, Pvt. Jasper Holmes.
Along with Cpl. Pete Anders, the private had been dispatched as a spy on Travers, a stockman suspected of rustling in the region. In denim jeans and hide vests, they didn't think any of Travers' men, who often visited the fort for business and pleasure, would recognize them as troopers.
So began days of scouring the piney hills and rocky draws of the area, with Travers only minimally helpful. He was hiding something, Bart thought. He was sure of it. That's why he stuck around. In any case, he'd had no luck finding Bret anywhere else.
Once, while their campfire snapped and the ashes flew, Lt. Crandall confided in Bart his fears of how Dale Travers had gone astray. And it wasn't in regards to rustling, either.
Crandall tapped his nose. "Bessie's with child. It's a bit of a guess, but Travers isn't being faithful to her, from what I've heard about 'im at the fort from Mexican traders."
"Our little secret then," said Bart, taking a big swig of his coffee.
It was raining out there! Looking up from under the brim of his pale-colored Stetson, Bart saw a land awash in a sudden, flooding rain. The Arizona wet season had arrived and rains glutted many of the area's rivers and streams, turning them into torrents of angry white water that eroded banks and dropped ancient trees like toothpicks into the spinning waters.
The sky had borne a gray tinge all morning. Clouds, massed in the east, unleashed more rain, but it was a warm, almost toasty, July rain.
Hunkering down in his oilskin and hat, Bart Maverick shivered and felt a chill run up his spine. Not only from the rain, but something else he felt. Bret was in this area. He and his brother often had a feeling or a notion about the other one, where he was likely to be. Or maybe he shivered because he'd always hated rain. Took cold easily.
A few more days passed while the rains fell. Even in the freshets and downpours, Lt. Melvin Crandall and his patrol continued to scour the area. One night he and Bart enjoyed the hospitality and goodwill of the man who owned these thousands of acres, Dale Travers.
At the same table where Bret had been regaled in his early weeks at the ranch, Travers treated Bart and the army lieutenant to a home-cooked meal while Crandall's men took supper with the bunkhouse crew. His drive to Ellsworth, Kansas, was coming up, and he really needed to send Crandall and this other Maverick on their way. He hoped at supper he could persuade them to leave, that there was nothing to see there.
As she served, Carla tried to get Bart's attention with a concoction of broken English spiced with Spanish. Bart laid his knife and fork down on his plate and smiled up at her. He understood Spanish pretty well and hoped to make Carla more comfortable by using it.
"¿Qué pasa, Carla?" What is it, Carla?
"Señor, había un hombre aquí, como usted." There was a man here, like you, she said. "Pero mas alto." Taller.
Bart smiled again and was ready to dismiss the housekeeper as a bit daffy, when she said, "Ay, ¿sabes dónde está el Sr. Maverick?" Ay, do you know where Sr. Maverick is?
Daubing his lips thoughtfully with a cloth napkin, he tried to hide his surprised expression.
"Carla, he left us, remember? ¿El se fue? He's gone?" said Travers from his end of the table. Bessie Travers hadn't come down to dinner, feeling somewhat ill in this summer heat.
"I'm curious, though. May I?" asked Bart, and Travers nodded. Crandall watched the interchange between Carla and the slick gambler from the sidelines.
"Carla, what a pretty name, muy bonito," Bart began, and caught her blushing. "¿Dices que mi hermano estaba aquí? You say my brother was here?" She nodded. "¿Cuando el se fue?" When did he leave?"
She caught Travers' look. So did Bart. "No lo sé, Señor," she replied. She didn't know – all of a sudden. "Tengo que volver a la cocina ahora." I have to go back to the kitchen now.
"¿Fue amable contigo?" Was he nice to you?
"Mucho," she said before going back into the kitchen for Bessie's night-tray. "Muy guapo, también." Very handsome, too.
Bart watched her go in awe. He and Crandall would have to get together later and talk about what had just happened. Till that time, he enjoyed Carla's meal.