Chapter 5

The captain wasn't in his office, yet, so the two Rangers put up their horses and went to eat breakfast. Capt. Johnson had shown up by the time they finished eating, so they went in to see him.

"Cap'n? We got sumpthin' to report," said Ezra.

"Yeah, I 'spect ya do. Otherwise, ya wouldn't be here. OK, spit it out."

"We found a place about five miles north of Carney that looks like an army camp, but they ain't wearing uniforms. There's at least ten buildin's that look like barracks an' they got armed guards walkin' around. One of 'em took a shot at us, so we lit out."

"Well, Sean, you got anythin' to add?"

"Yeah, Cap'n. They all got funny tattoos on their left hands that they uses to identify each other. It looks like a burning cross. You reckon they're KKK?"

Captain Johnson jumped upright from his slouch to sit very straight, "Are you sure of that tattoo, Ranger Murphy?"

Sean had never heard him sound like that, before. It was almost frightening! "Yeah, Cap'n. I'm dead certain."

"You two sit right where you are. Don't move. I'll be back within half an hour." With that, the captain rushed out of his office and headed out the front toward the hotel.

He was back within 15 minutes with the two men who had been in his office the day before. "Sean and Ezra, these two gentlemen are Col. Andrew Jordon and Maj. Jefferson MacGregor of the Rangers headquarters in Austin. They want to ask you a few questions."

MacGregor sat in the captain's chair behind the desk and Jordon took the only other chair in the office. Johnson pulled in a chair from the lobby and closed the door before he sat down. Col. Jordon proceeded to grill Sean and Ezra in excruciating detail about what had happened to them the last few days, starting with the encounter with the stagecoach bandits and running through their escape from the pseudo-military camp. By the time he was through with the questioning, Maj. MacGregor had many pages of notes and Sean and Ezra felt like they had just been tortured from the intensity of the questioning. The two friends were dismissed to eat lunch and get some sleep while the three officers discussed the situation.

Jordon stared intently at Johnson and asked, "Are these men reliable? Can we believe what they tell us?"

"Colonel, Sir, I'd stake my life on those two men. They look crude an' unintelligent, but I'd stack them up to any two men ya could find anywhere. Yes, Sir, we kin believe everythin' they said!"

"Very good, Captain. That was my opinion, but I wanted you to verify it. Thank you."

"Yes, Sir. Thank you."

"Now, Captain, please come with us to the stage line office. We must commandeer a coach and get to Austin as quickly as possible. Thank God we were in Laredo when all this happened. You must detail as many men as you can to delaying those scoundrels at Carney as much as possible. Perhaps Murphy and Woodpacker should lead that effort. Hopefully, we can keep the villains from starting a new war with Mexico." The Colonel and Major stood up, and the Captain did, too, only a little after the Major.

The three men went to the stage office and explained who they were and the importance, without giving details, of why they needed to get to Austin without delay. The manager assigned his smallest and fastest stage to their use, along with an expert driver and a reliable guard. They were able to leave within the hour and Capt. Johnson went back to his office to consider how he could juggle his manpower assignments.

About 4:00 o'clock that afternoon, Sean and Ezra wandered back in to the captain's office and asked, "What do ya want from us, now, Cap'n?"

"Sean, ya and Ezra are bein' put in charge of a detail to slow down an' mess up that operation at Carney as best ya can. I can give ya six more men to help y'all. Don't get into a pitched battle with them yahoos, 'cause y'all ain't got enough men fer that. But do anythin' y'all kin to keep them from completin' their trainin'. I can't tell y'all what to do from sittin' here, but do whatever y'all kin."

"Sure, cap'n. Whatever ya say."

"Here's the list of men I picked out fer y'all to take along. Any problems with any of 'em?"

"Nah, Cap'n, they're all steady men. They'll do fine. Ya think so, Ezra?"

"Oh, sure, no problem with none of 'em."

"OK, y'all wait here an' I'll call 'em in an' explain the assignment."

A few minutes later, six men followed the captain into his office and stood around waiting to hear why they were there. "Men, I've got a special assignment fer y'all that's all out of the line of what ya're used to. We got a situation down near Carney where some fools are tryin' to get the USA into a war with Mexico. The officers in Austin are working on a permanent solution, but y'all got to hold the fort for a little while 'til they can get things set up. Sean and Ezra, here, found their camp and know the most about this operation, so I'm puttin' them in charge of this detail. Any of y'all got a problem with that?"

After a chorus of "No," the captain went on. "Yer job's to confuse and confound these yahoos 'til help arrives. My guess is that will be more than three weeks, an' maybe as much as six weeks. It'll be up to y'all to keep those idiots from starting a war. Y'all give them a hard time, but don't get into a stand-up fight, cause I can't send y'all any help. Take orders from Sean and Ezra and y'all will do jus' fine."

The Rangers left for Carney the next morning right after breakfast. As they traveled, Sean and Ezra described what they knew about the camp setup. The men discussed various ploys for discommoding the enemy and decided that fire would be a good place to start. They wanted to avoid being noticed for as long as possible, so they had to be careful not to do too many spectacular things at one time. Eventually, they planned to spike the cannon and steal the draft horses, but they wanted to do other things first. Hopefully, they would come up with enough ideas to keep the place jumping and not able to train effectively.

That night, three of the Rangers sneaked into the camp and up to the rear of one of the barracks buildings. Two of the men stood guard while the third built a small fire in the crawl-space near the chimney. Hopefully, after the camp officials had put the fire out, they would think that the fire was an accident from careless use of the stove. The fire was built near the center of the crawl-space and not easy to see until too late. The three fire-bugs made a successful escape and all eight men waited around to see what would happen.

The fire wasn't spotted until it had gotten a good start, so there was quite an effort expended in fighting the fire. There were shouts of "fire!" and a lot of running around during the first few minutes after the discovery of the fire, but the men on the second floor didn't all get the word in time. A majority of men there were forced to jump from the windows and a number suffered broken bones or sprains from the fall. It looked to the Rangers as if there had never been any fire drills, because nobody seemed to know what to do, at first.

They finally got a bucket-line formed, but, by this time, it was far too late to save the building. In fact, they almost lost a second barracks building when the wind came up and blew embers onto it from the already burning structure. They were able to save the second building only because they abandoned the first to the flames.

Once the fire was going well enough to have the undivided attention of everyone in the camp, Sean sent all the Rangers out to find the ammunition dump. It turned out to be a building well separated from the camp and half buried in the ground. Sean said, "When we set that off, no way will they believe that it was an accident! We'll have to push it down on our to-do list."

They went back to their rooms in the hotel and slept the sleep of the righteous, two men to a bed. The next morning, after breakfast, they rode out of town to find a pleasant place to have a meeting away from any possible eavesdroppers. Ezra opened the meeting with the comment, "I've been thinkin'. Could we find some Loco Weed and dose their water supply? That sure as hell would delay 'em fer a week or so."

Archie Taylor said, "I know just where to look for some. We'd have to be very careful with handlin' it. It can kill ya ifen ya ain't 'specially careful."

Sean asked, "Did anybody see where their well was? I don't remember a stream or crick anywhere near. It's a good idee ifen they use a well, but it won't work ifen they use runnin' water."

Charlie Smith replied, "Yeah, I saw their well while we wuz huntin' the ammo dump. It should be easy to dump some Loco Weed in it one night."

"OK, Archie, ya an' Charlie take the rest of the day to find some Loco Weed. Be sure to wear gloves when y'all handle it and throw the gloves away when y'all finish. Tear the leaves up into tiny pieces an' maybe they won't notice it in the water."

"Sean, ifen we make a bag outa cheese cloth, we could put the Loco Weed in that along with a couple of rocks and toss the whole shebang into the well. The rocks will hold the bag under water. The loco stuff will soak out of the bag into the water and we won't have to worry about them noticin' the leaves in the water."