Chapter 8
The dawn light trickled through the trunks of the trees in long golden lines, painting zebra stripes on the world around Jeff. It was chilly, despite it being August, and he shifted a little in his saddle to get his jacket buttoned up.
“How sure are we about this?” Jeff asked in a whisper. “Did they get a good look at the camp? How can they be sure it’s El Aguila’s main base when we don’t know what he looks like?”
“All good questions,” Robert said. “And we should be able to find out the answers pretty soon.”
“Maybe we should take another look,” Michael said. He smiled at Jeff. “Feel like doing a little reconnaissance?”
Jeff nodded. “I would love to.”
Sliding down from the saddle, Jeff and Michael made their way through the trees to the ridge. It wasn’t terribly steep down into the valley, more of a rolling grass plain than anything else, and these trees were the best cover for miles.
Jeff considered the insanity of placing a camp here, where anyone could blunder into it. That didn’t make sense. El Aguila’s camps were generally hard to find and a pain to get to. That one up in the hills hadn’t been the easiest place to reach. So, why was this one so easily accessible?
Jeff dropped down to a crouch, not wanting to make a silhouette on the ridge. Michael did the same thing. Then they moved slowly forward until they could see the ground ahead of them clearly.
There was a camp. Several rows of tents stood around a central campfire. It was quiet there. Nothing moved.
“There you go,” Michael said. “They’re still asleep, the whole lot of them.”
Where were the lookouts? Jeff frowned. “Does something look off to you? How did we find out about this place?”
“One of the farmers came across it with his son when they were out patrolling,” Michael said.
“Mr. Pike brought us the information.” Peering down into the valley, Michael shrugged.
“Admittedly, it looks kind of dead now. Maybe bandits don’t get up as early as other folks. There sure are a lot of tents.”
“There sure are,” Jeff agreed. He counted about twenty tents. So, if the bandits doubled up in them, that meant forty of them were asleep down there, waiting to be attacked by about thirty Unity citizens. These weren’t odds that Jeff liked.
“It’s still all quiet,” Michael said. “Let’s go tell the others.”
They moved back the way they had come, and while Michael told the others what they had seen, Jeff pondered the situation.
Only a day ago the word had come in that they had found El Aguila’s main camp.
It was a certainty, they’d been told, which was what bothered Jeff.
Andrew and Michael could hardly set foot out of their houses without someone keeping an eye on them.
It was subtle, and he was certain that they didn’t know that Robert, in his capacity as sheriff, had ordered the security, but there it was.
Surely El Aguila, who had to have a lot of folks gunning for him, would also have people on watch in his camp.
“Okay, let’s split up like we discussed and hit them from two sides,” Robert said.
Jeff looked over at Michael as they rode through the trees to the place where they would ride down into the valley.
“Mike, I think we’re rushing this,” Jeff said, trying to keep his voice low.
“Why?” one of the farmers’ sons said. His name was Christian, and he looked like he was hardly old enough to shave. Yet here he was, shotgun and all.
“Because something doesn’t feel right,” Jeff said. Not that he could put his finger on the problem exactly.
He thought of Bonnie and what she’d say if he said something like that to her. She would say that he should go and do something else, let his mind work out the problem for him.
The only problem was, there was no time for that.
As the other farm folks they had been paired with rode around him, tense smiles on their faces, guns in their hands, Jeff began to feel very nervous.
These young men, hardly more than children, didn’t know much about dealing with bandits.
They had learned a bit in the last little while, but they didn’t understand how this particular bandit leader operated.
El Aguila should have been called the Fox or something because he was a wily fellow, always scheming.
“Hold up!” Jeff called before the party split into two. “Just hold up a moment!”
Everyone stopped.
“What’s wrong?” Christian asked. “You got cold feet?”
“No,” Jeff said. “Something’s wrong.”
“What?” Michael asked.
“Look, if we don’t go now, we’ll miss our opportunity,” Robert said, frowning at him. “What’s got you looking like that? I’ve seen that look. There’s something brewing in your mind.”
“There is,” Jeff confessed. “Something isn’t right down there.”
Robert nodded. “I’ll go take a look.”
He slipped out of his saddle and, together with Jeff, went to the lookout spot. The camp looked the same, and that in itself was worrisome.
“Someone should be awake by now,” Jeff said. “They should be building up their fire for coffee. Fetching water from the creek. Something.”
“It does look terribly quiet down there,” Robert agreed.
“What’s the hold-up?” Andrew asked as he came up to them.
“Jeff’s gut is complaining about the mission,” Robert said in a tone that Jeff couldn’t quite read. Was he making fun of him?
“Well, if we want to do this, we should go,” Andrew said, “before they wake up. And remember, I want as many of them alive as we can take. Especially El Aguila. He has to be taken alive.”
“It would help if we had some idea of what he looked like,” Michael said.
“He’ll be the one they run to protect,” Andrew said. “Now, let’s go.”
“Come on, Jeff, there’s nothing wrong down there,” Robert said. “They were probably out last night causing trouble and are sleeping in a bit.” He patted Jeff on the shoulder. “Let’s go.”
Jeff moved reluctantly. He knew if he just had a moment, he would put his finger on the problem, but there wasn’t time. All he could hope for was that whatever the problem was, it wouldn’t get them killed.
Back on his horse again, he followed the others to the place where they would ride down into the valley. It was a short gallop to the camp, and Jeff pulled out his gun and waited. Robert was leading their group, and he waited for the signal from the others that they were in place.
The signal came a moment later.
“Ride hard and fast,” Robert said, and just like that, he urged his horse on and went thundering down the slope into the valley. The others followed, streaming in with Jeff caught up in the middle somewhere, his mind still working fast.
Was it possible that El Aguila was so proud and cocksure that he wouldn’t have posted guards? Was he so convinced that he was safe that no one was on a foot patrol? Was anyone on a mounted patrol?
And then he had it, the thing that had been bugging him. “Where are the horses?” he asked.
No one heard him, but Jeff knew now that this had to be a trap. They were riding headlong into a dangerous situation. He had to do something.
Urging his horse to run faster, Jeff tried to catch up to Robert and Michael, who were right out in front. The horses’ hooves thundered on the turf, kicking up a cloud of dust. The sunlight glinted on the barrels of guns, and Jeff’s heart rose into his throat.
He was overcome by a deep, visceral urge to go home and see Bonnie again. It was suddenly all he wanted to do, and he almost turned his horse around. But he couldn’t do that. He had to try and save the others.
“Stop!” he yelled, trying to be heard over the thunder of hooves. “Everyone! Please! Stop!”
His words were drowned out, and eventually, he choked on the dust and was silenced as he continued to ride down the slope into the tent town.
Well, if he couldn’t stop them by yelling, then he would ride to the front and stop them somehow from there.
Gritting his teeth and urging his horse on, Jeff rode faster, swerving between the other horses, trying to get to the front. Michael was there up front, his horse streaking out ahead of everyone. This was a disaster. Why was Michael so eager?
He pushed and pushed, but there was only so fast a horse could run. And then Christian’s horse shot out in front, the boy screaming and brandishing his weapon.
Jeff held his breath, praying that he was wrong, that nothing would happen, that it would all be fine, but his prayers and hopes were in vain.
As the boy came level with the first row of tents, something whirred through the air and struck him in the shoulder with such force he was thrown backward in the saddle.
Which was lucky, as a hail of arrows came flying past him.
“Look out!” Michael called, turning his horse at the last second. The hail of arrows went by him, one hitting his horse in the flank and another slicing his arm.
Jeff saw the blood blooming on them both. By the time several others had been hit, Jeff was riding around the outside of the camp.
“It’s boobytrapped!” he yelled just as, on the other side of the camp, more cries rang through the air. “Everyone, stop the charge!”
But men in a frenzy were hard to redirect, and some still rode on into the camp, perhaps thinking that there was only danger on the outside.
Jeff didn’t know what to do as the sounds of men and horses screaming in pain filled the air. He couldn’t make heads or tails of anything from the outside, and the tents had their guide ropes tied down in such a way that there really were only two ways into the camp.
Guiding his horse around, noting the lack of gunfire, Jeff entered the camp and dismounted.
The first thing he noticed was that the entryway had been trapped with a tripwire.
The oldest and easiest trick in the book.
Cautiously, Jeff made his way through. There were no bandits in this camp.
It was a trick, a trap, and they had sprung it.
The question was, why set it in the first place?
And what was the ultimate aim of the trap?
Was it to hurt, maim, or break them? Was it to scare them?
He didn’t know.
Walking through the camp as the others began to realize what he had worked out before, Jeff found more tripwires, all pulled loose from their moorings and made redundant now that their deadly deception had been deployed.
“That El Aguila is one heck of a trickster,” he muttered.
“Gather around! Come on, all of you, gather around!” It was Andrew.
Jeff left his investigation and followed some of the others.
“How are you?” Jeff asked as he walked up to Michael. “I saw the arrow hit, but it didn’t look fatal.”
Michael smiled. “It’s a scratch, and I’m sure that Kyle will have some trick for looking after the horse’s minor wound.”
“I think it’s safe to say that El Aguila isn’t here,” Andrew said when everyone was gathered. “Are we all here? Is anyone badly hurt?”
The men looked around, and apart from some nasty wounds, everyone was there and upright. They hadn’t lost a man or a horse to this little misadventure.
Andrew smiled as he looked around and then his expression became sober. “We’ve been played for fools. It’s clear that letting the farmers track them was part of the subterfuge to lead us here and cause some damage. Well, we’ll know better next time.”
“But why would he do this?” Christian asked. He was now wearing a makeshift bandage on his arm as so many others were. The boy’s face was red, possibly with rage. “Why bring us out here? To shoot a few arrows at us?”
“No one knows why El Aguila does what he does,” Andrew said.
“But if we’re all okay, then I suggest we move carefully through the tents and make sure there isn’t something here that can be useful.
Maybe he was here at one point, and this was the camp’s defense mechanism.
We don’t know, so let’s go find out. Everyone fan out and check the tents, but do it carefully.
There’s no knowing if there are more traps or not. ”
Jeff and Michael teamed up without even discussing it. They headed to the nearest tent.
“Well, I have to give it to you,” Michael said with a nod and a grin. “Your gut is on point. This was a bad idea. What was it about this place that made you so mistrustful?”
Jeff sighed. “It was a few things. No smoke, no movement at all, and the most obvious of all, no horses. How many bandits do you know who don’t have horses penned close by? They don’t walk all over the countryside.”
Michael shook his head. “You always were very observant. So, come along now and tell me what you see here. Anything I need to worry about before I open this tent flap?”
Jeff almost missed the spiderweb-thin piece of cotton that tied the flap to something inside. All he could do was take out his knife and hope that he could cut the thread before whatever was inside was deployed.
“Ah, Mike, you might want to stand to the side,” Jeff said slowly as he held the knife blade under the thread.
Michael did as instructed and made sure no one else was in the way of whatever might come out of that tent.
“Okay, fellows!” Michael bellowed. “The tent flaps are boobytrapped, so be careful. There’s a thread, thin as cotton. Make sure you cut it and then get out of the way!”
Cries of “Okay!” rang through the air.
Carefully, Jeff cut the wire.
Nothing happened.
Jeff proceeded to lift the tent flap just a smidge. He peered under it.
“What do you see?” Michael asked, coming closer.
“Nothing much,” Jeff said. He gently began to move the flap to the side.
“Stop!” Michael yelled, making him jump.
Jeff stopped, freezing in place. He studied the flap and then he saw it. Another thread. How had they done this? And why was it so elaborate? Jeff’s stomach dropped to his knees. No one ever did something like this for a good reason. It was always to do great harm.
Jeff was about to cut the second thread when the world was suddenly filled with people yelling.
“Run!” Christian screamed as he came pelting past them in a group of men, all running alongside their horses.
Michael and Jeff didn’t need telling twice; they got to their feet and ran.
As they reached the edge of the tent camp, a mighty boom rang through the air, and a blast of hot air picked them both up and threw them clear of the tents.
More booms sounded, the ground shook, and a hard rain of debris fell around them. Jeff covered his head with his arms and lay on the ground, stunned, winded, and with a terrible roaring in his ears.