Dead Man's Walk

“It ain’t our fault they didn’t get to be escorts,” Gus said. “Escorting’s hard work—here we are with a thousand men ready to kill us. Maybe they will kill us. If I have to die I’d just as soon do it with something in my stomach.”

“No,” Call said. “Just shut up and wait. Maybe Colonel Cobb will buy food for the troop and then we can all eat.“Caleb Cobb was in the General’s tent for over an hour. Not a sound came through the canvas. Gus and Call had nothing to do but wait. Captain Salazar soon went off to attend to some duty, leaving the two of them standing there amid their foes. The cups of coffee had been tiny; no one else offered them anything.

While they stood and waited, though, the Mexican cavalry divided itself into two groups, and moved out. One wing went south of the group of Rangers; the other wing flanked the Rangers to the north.

Then the massed infantry began the same maneuver. Several hundred men marched north of the Rangers—another several hundred marched south. The Rangers stood as they were, watching these developments helplessly.

“I wish our boys would take cover—only where’s the cover to take?” Gus asked. “Pretty soon they’ll be surrounded.”

“You’re right about the cover,” Call said. “There ain’t none to take.”

“I wish the Colonel would come out—I’d like to know he’s still alive,” Gus said. The fact that no sound had come from the General’s tent had begun to worry him.

“I expect he’s alive—we’d have heard it if they shot him,” Call said.

“Well, they might have cut his throat,” Gus said. “Mexicans are handy with knives.”

He had scarcely said it before the flaps of the tent opened and Caleb Cobb stepped out, wearing the same pleasant expression he had worn when he went in.

“Corporal McCrae, did they feed you?” he asked.

“They offered,” Gus said. “Corporal Call declined.”

“Oh, why’s that? I had an excellent breakfast myself. The eggs were real tasty.”

“I won’t eat with skunks when my friends are starving,” Call said.

“I see—that’s the noble point of view,” Caleb said. “I’m better at the selfish point of view, myself. You’ll seldom see me neglect my own belly. My friends’ bellies are their lookout.”

“I’d just as soon leave,” Call said. “I’ve been stared at long enough by people I’d just as soon shoot.”

“That’s brash, under the circumstances,” Caleb said. “You can’t go, though.”

“Why not?” Call asked.

“Because I just surrendered,” Caleb said. “I’ve a promise that if we lay down our arms not a man will be killed. I’ve done laid down mine—handed them to the General’s orderly.”

Gus was startled, Call angry. It was infuriating to have their own leader simply walk into a fancy tent with a fat general and surrender, without giving any of his men a chance to have their say.

“I expect to keep my weapons, unless I’m killed,” Call said, in a tight voice.

“You can’t keep them, Corporal—you have to give them up,” Caleb said, with a menacing glance. “When I give an order I expect to have it obeyed. You’re a young man. I won’t have you dying over this foolishness.”

“I’d rather die right now, fighting, than to be put in irons again,” Call said. “I won’t be put in irons.”

“Why, no—there’ll be no fetters this time,” Caleb said. “This is a peaceable surrender the General and I have worked out. Nobody on either side needs to get hurt. As soon as the boys over there on the ridge have given up their weapons, we can all sit down and have breakfast like friends.”

“You mean we can just go home, as long as we ain’t armed?” Gus asked.

“No, not home—not right away,” Caleb said. “You’ll all be visiting Mexico, for a spell.”

“We’ll be prisoners, you mean?” Call asked. “You mean we’ve marched all this way just to be prisoners?”

Caleb Cobb turned to one of the Mexican officers, and said a few words in Spanish. The officer, a young skinny fellow, looked startled, but he immediately took his sidearm and handed it to Caleb, who leveled it at Call.

“Corporal, if you’re determined to be dead I’ll oblige you myself,” he said. “I shot Captain Falconer for disobedience and I’ll shoot you for the same reason.”

He cocked the pistol.

“Woodrow, give up your guns,” Gus said, putting a hand on Call’s arm. He could see that his friend was tight as a spring. He had never intervened in Woodrow Call’s conflicts before, but he felt that if he didn’t try this time, his only true friend would be shot before his eyes. Caleb Cobb was not a man to make idle threats.

Call shook off Gus’s hand. He was ready to leap at Caleb, even if it meant his death.

Gus quickly stepped between the two men, handing over his pistol and rifle as he did. The nearest Mexican officer took them.

“Give it up, Woodrow,” he repeated.

“Corporal McCrae, you’re more sensible than your pal,” Caleb said. “Corporal Call ain’t sensible, but if he’ll take your advice and hand over them weapons, we’ll all get out of this without loss of life.”

Call saw, with bitter anger, that his situation was hopeless. Even if he sprang at Caleb and knocked the pistol aside, a hundred Mexicans would shoot him before he could flee.

“I despise you for a coward,” he said to Caleb; but he handed over his guns.

Caleb shrugged, and turned to Captain Salazar, who had come out of the tent in time to witness the little standoff.

“Captain, would you oblige me and put this man under heavy guard until he cools off?” Caleb asked. “He’s too brash for his own damn good.”

“Certainly, Colonel,” Salazar said. “I’ll assign six men.”

Caleb looked at Call again—the young Ranger was quivering, and the look in his eyes was a look of hatred.

“Assign ten, Captain,” Caleb said. “Six men might could handle him, if he decides to break out. But this is the man who shot Buffalo Hump’s son—he’ll fight, if he sees any room.”

“I don’t care if you do call yourself colonel,” Call said. “You had no right to surrender us.”

Caleb Cobb ignored him—he gave the skinny young officer the sidearm he had just borrowed.

“Gracias,” he said. “Corporal McCrae, I want you to walk back over to that ridge where the troop is and tell them to give up their guns. Tell them they won’t be hurt, and tell them they’ll be fed as soon as they surrender.”

“I’ll go, Colonel, but they may not like the news,” Gus said.

Caleb gestured toward the Mexican army, which had quickly surrounded the little group on the ridge. The infantry had formed a tight ring, with the cavalry massed in two lines outside it.

“We’re not having an Alamo or a Goliad, not here,” Caleb said.“Colonel Travis was a fool, though a brave fool. At least he had a church to fight in—we don’t even have a tree to hide behind. This little war is over.”

“Go along—tell them that,” he added. “The sooner you go, the sooner they’ll get breakfast.”

“Woodrow, hold steady,” Gus said, before leaving. “It won’t help nobody for you to get killed.”

Caleb Cobb went back into the General’s tent. Nearby, three soldiers were hitching a team of sorrel mares to a fine buggy with a canvas canopy over it.

Gus gave Call’s arm a squeeze, and started walking back toward the ridge where the troop waited. He had assumed a few Mexicans would go along to keep an eye on him, but none did. He walked out of the Mexican camp alone, through the blowing grass.

A group of ten soldiers, led by Captain Salazar, surrounded Call and marched him about a hundred yards from the General’s tent.

“Sit, Corporal—rest yourself,” Salazar said. “You have a very long walk ahead. Perhaps now that this foolish invasion is over, you would care to eat.”