Dillinger - Jack Higgins [66]
'Bullshit,' Dillinger said. 'I've made up my mind. Rivera will be exchanged for the girl.'
'No,' Rivera said from the comer. 'I will not do it!'
Nachita stood facing all of them. To Dillinger he said, 'You believe Ortiz because he spilled the rest of the water.'
Dillinger nodded.
'You think he will act with honour?'
'It's a chance worth taking.'
'You Yankees,' Nachita said, 'are naive. You believe what you want to believe.'
Dillinger turned to Villa. 'You bring Rivera out. I'll come with you to take the kid. She's just seen me twice, she'll be less frightened if I pick her up.'
Villa twisted Rivera's arms behind his back and pushed him out of the door.
Outside the chapel Dillinger made himself fully visible so that Ortiz could see he wasn't armed. The chanting stopped. There was a rustling in the thicket across the clearing and Ortiz appeared. Near him, the thicket opened and a young Apache was visible, carrying Juanita in a blanket.
'Put her down!' Dillinger barked.
The young Apache didn't understand him, but Ortiz said something and the Apache put Juanita at Ortiz's feet. It was at that moment that the child recognized Rivera, who was held and being pushed by Villa from behind. She got up to run to her father, but Ortiz grabbed her hand.
'Sit!' he commanded. 'Not yet.'
Then Ortiz advanced to the centre of the clearing. 'At last, Rivera,' he said. Then to Villa, 'I will take him.'
No man in the history of the world could have looked more frightened than Rivera did at that moment, or more pathetic.
Ortiz said, 'Rivera, you died when you shot Father Tomas. You died when you let twenty Apaches die in the mine. Today I merely carry out the sentence.'
Dillinger said, 'Let's cut the palaver. Have the kid brought forward.'
Ortiz motioned to the young Apache, he picked up Juanita in her blanket and again moved her to where Ortiz now stood.
'We will now exchange justice for justice,' Ortiz said, 'life for life.'
'No, you won't,' Rivera said, suddenly lunging for the child, trying to take her up in his arms. Villa, taken by surprise, made a try at holding Rivera back.
In one swift movement Ortiz reached into his clothing and pulled out a long-barrelled Smith and Wesson and, his eyes like a madman's, aimed at Rivera, pulling the trigger again and again. Rivera dropped the wriggling, screaming, frightened child. As Rivera crumpled, Ortiz raised the Smith and Wesson and emptied it at Villa's chest. Then he swooped up the screaming Juanita and ran with her back into the thicket, leaving her blanket behind.
Dillinger could see that the young Apache had been taken completely by surprise at Ortiz's perfidy for he stood like a statue for a second before dashing after Ortiz into the bushes.
Dillinger, betrayed, waited for bullets to thud into him from either direction, the thicket or the chapel. He glanced down at the bodies. Rivera was clearly dead. Villa was still breathing, so Dillinger knelt beside the man, whose breath came in bubbles and whose eyes said it is the luck of the game, and he died.
Chavasse, Rose, Nachita were all coming across the clearing from the chapel, armed with rifles but not firing into the thicket after Ortiz for fear of hitting the child.
Dillinger tried to say something to Rose, but she averted her face.
Nachita said, 'You all go back to the chapel. I will be back soon,' and he went off in the direction in which Ortiz had vanished.
17
They buried Rivera and Villa in a shallow grave in the pine trees. When they had finished, Dillinger returned to the chapel.
He stood at the window and looked out across the desert at the mountain. Strangely enough, he didn't feel tired, but as if he had just awakened from a long sleep.
A small wind blew in through the door, setting the lantern creaking on its chain above the altar, carrying with it the scent of pine, and he could almost hear the stillness.
Chavasse slept peacefully, all strain washed from his face, and Rose lay on a blanket beside the grey ashes of the fire, her head pillowed on one arm. He stood for a long