This book is fiction. No resemblance is intended between any character herein and any person, living or dead; any such resemblance is purely coincidental.

      Copyright, © 1962 by Pyramid Publications, Inc.

      All Rights Reserved

      ONE

      RANGER WALT SLADE, NAMED BY THE PEONES of the Rio Grande River villages, El Halcón—The Hawk—rode to Brownsville, Texas, from the south. After zig-zagging across the Mexican States of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo Leon, and Tamaulipas. Quite a roundabout route, but necessary, under the circumstances.

      “Shadow, once again the hellion did the unexpected,” he murmured to his tall black horse. “I was just about sure for certain that when he skalleyhooted out of Texas, he’d head for the mountain country of Sinaloa. That’s just what he didn’t do. Instead, he headed east, raising hell and shoving a chunk under a corner, as usual. Left his customary trail of blood and bones in his wake. Took time out to rob a bank, a couple of stage coaches and a railroad express car, and the devil alone knows what else. At least six killings to his credit that we’re sure of. Has got all northern Mexico in an uproar.

      “Oh, it’s Veck Sosna on the loose again, all right. No doubt in my mind as to that. Everything ties in with the Sosna method. And he’s already managed to collect a following of side-winders. Six in the bunch that robbed the Coyame bank and killed the cashier. Now it looks like he might be sliding back into Texas. Well, perhaps we’ll be able to learn something in Matamoros or Brownsville.”

      Reining the big black in, Slade hooked one long leg comfortably over the saddle horn and rolled a cigarette. He made a striking picture in the dying light, the last rays of the setting sun etching his sternly handsome profile in flame. Very tall, more than six feet, with broad shoulders that slimmed down to a sinewy waist.

      His face was in keeping with his splendid form—lean, deeply bronzed; the grin quirkings at the corners of his rather wide mouth lessened somewhat the tinge of fierceness evinced by the prominent hawk nose above the powerful jaw and chin beneath. His countenance was dominated by black-lashed eyes of a very pale gray; cold and reckless eyes, but in their depths little devils of laughter seemed to lurk, devils that could spring forward in warmth and kindliness on occasion, or could instantly become devils, not at all laughing, did the incident of the moment warrant such a transformation. His pushed-back “J.B.” revealed crisp, thick hair so black a faint blue shadow seemed to lie upon it.

      Slade wore the homely but efficient garb of the rangeland—Levi’s, the bibless overalls favored by the cowhand, faded blue shirt with vivid neckerchief looped at the open throat, well scuffed half-boots of softly tanned leather.

      About his lean waist were double cartridge belts, from which the carefully worked and oiled cut-out holsters carrying the black butts of heavy guns protruded.

      And from the butts of those big Colt Forty-fives his muscular hands never seemed far away.

      His mount was in keeping with the rest of him, full eighteen hands in height, black as a starless night, his coat a satiny gloss that caught the light, his eyes large and filled with fire and intelligence.

      Slade sat smoking thoughtfully and gazing toward Matamoros, the Mexican town on the south bank of the Rio Grande, across from Brownsville.

      Matamoros was really not much older than Brownsville but had been battered and battle-scarred into a semblance of antiquity. It was a typical Mexican Border town with sleepy plazas, and a ragged edge of squalid pole and adobe huts heming it in. It had been burned a couple of times and pillaged more than once.

      The Plaza de Hidalgo, surrounded by better homes and buildings, was the chief center of activity. There was a huddle of curio shops, miniature bazaars and saloons. Outward from the plaza were low, one-story structures, mostly of brick, built close against the narrow sidewalks.

      Matamoros always reminded Slade of an old peon wrapped in a tattered serape, sombrero pulled low, drowsing in the sun; but with a ready knife beneath the blanket.

      That was Matamoros, lethargic, somnolent, but a powder keg only needing a spark to blow sky high.

      Slade rode through the Calle Abasolo, the City Market Place, vibrant with colors, and filled with odors and sounds, where everything from food to jugs, kettles and mats were for sale. He was headed for a posado, or inn, that adjoined a cantina and, like the more primitive meson, catered to man and beast. The establishments were owned and operated by one Amado Menendez, fat, jolly, but plenty salty if necessary, with whom Slade was well acquainted.

      “Time for you to put on the nosebag, jughead,” he told the horse. “You’ve been on sort of short rations for the past week. Amado will remember you and see to it that you get the best. I can use a good surrounding like Amado’s puts out myself, for a change, and a decent bed to sleep in. Then we’ll see what’s what.”

      Amado’s cantina was not far from the river, in a section that enjoyed a somewhat dubious reputation. Here more than one plot and counterplot had been hatched, sometimes to the detriment of Brownsville across the river, the Texas town receiving, with almost equal frequency, the bullets and the refugees of battles between rival factions in Matamoros. Deserters from the various factions looted both sides of the river with cheerful impartiality. Which tended to distrub peaceful citizens of both communities.

      Near where the cantina stood, with its back windows looking across it, was a wharf to which the small river steamers tied up to unload cargo designed for Matamoros, when they paused before crossing the stream to Brownsville.

      In front of the cantina was a hitch-rack at which a number of shaggy Mexican ponies were tethered. Slade dismounted and dropped the split reins to the ground.

      “Be right back after you,” he told Shadow, and entered the saloon, from which came the sound of music and gay voices.

      Although it was early, there was already a fair crowd at the bar and the tables. Heads raised as the tall Ranger pushed his way through the doors. Amado Menendez, the owner, was at the far end of the bar. He stared, then came hurrying forward, his rubicund face wreathed in smiles.

      “Cápitan!” he cried, “is it really you? Verily, wise is the voice of our people that says, ‘Mountain never meets with mountain, but at daybreak or at even man shall meet again with man.’ For now in the glow of the sunset I find El Halcón, my friend!”

      He seized Slade’s hand and shook it vigorously, chattering the while in both Spanish and his Mission-taught English.

      “Ha! amigo, doubtless you hunger and thirst,” he said. “We will drink and we will dine.”

      “First my horse,” Slade replied.

      “Sí the beautiful caballo!” Amado exclaimed. “Him I remember well. With my own hands will I lead him to his rest. Come!

      “Ha! he remembers me!” he added delightedly, as Shadow pricked his ears forward and blew softly through his nose.

      With his arm across the horse’s neck, he led the way past the inn, which shouldered the cantina, and to the building which adjoined it on the far side and housed the stable. The old keeper in charge bobbed and grinned, and bowed reverently to Slade.

      Shadow remembered him, too, and permitted himself to be led to a stall where all his wants would be provided for. Slade picked up his saddle pouches and his rifle.

      “The best room in the posado,” said Amado. “There we will place them, where Cápitan will woo slumber this night.”

      The room in question proved to be large, airy and comfortably furnished, boasting two wide windows.

      “And now to attend to the