The Ghost Warriors
                                       by Michael Moorcock

News came to the young vigilante that El Lobo Blanco—the White Wolf—was on the warpath again and leading his fanatical followers against his old enemies. What had caused the Apache Nation's most bloodthirsty secret society to revive their vendetta against the Texans—and where had so many warriors come from?? And why had they kidnapped Tex Brady's beautiful young wife? The Masked Buckaroo meant to find out—even if it meant chasing some fanatical religious fundamentalist gents to the very gates of Hell—and beyond!
A GRIPPING YARN OF BAD MEN, BAD LANDS AND BAD BLOOD

A previously unpublished story of 
The Masked Buckaroo

by Warwick Colvin Jnr.
Author of 
'A Texan Revenge',
'Tex Brady's Secret', 
'Tex of the Circle Squared',
'The Masked Buckaroo's Courtship',
'Dealin' Straight',
'Turnin' Trails',
'Herdin' Days',
'Talkin' Nights',
'Ridin' Point',
'Birthin' Beeves',
'Ropin' Broncs',
'Buckin' Bulls',
'Eatin' Lead',
'Suckin' Emus',
'Smokin' Weed',
'Shovelin' Chips',
'Raisin' Roses',
'Windy's Last Yodel',
'Tex's Daughters',
'Range War Memories',
'Scrapin' Barrels' &c. &c 

For Clarence E. Mulford and Ben Ostrander

The Ghost Warriors
by
Warwick Colvin Jnr.
as told to his good pard,
Michael Moorcock

Chapter One: El Lobo Blanco

SHORTY, PINTO PETE, The Breed Papoose, and some of the other hands were up on the West Range pretending to mend fences and find strays but actually, as their boss was aware, searching out shade and sweet water because the heat was so hard and dry it felt like a sack of old cement on your sweat-soaked back and the real reason Tex, head wrangler and owner of the outfit, had sent them up there was to keep some kind of look out, which was just as well because Shorty squints up from where he's standing neck high in a pool of mud and shades his eyes and says to his dozing compadres, "Ain't that Swedish Charlie makin' dust yonder?" 
Shorty was the binoculars of the Circle Squared Ranch on account of his extreme long-sightedness, so it was a while before his identification was confirmed. It was indeed, the rest agreed, Swedish Charlie, sometimes known as 'Sarajevo', who was riding in as if he'd eaten ten bowls of chilli and was about to soil his breeches. He was standing in his stirrup when he reached us and brought his pony to a spectacular 'Mexican skid' so that he was on the ground before his mount knew she had stopped galloping. 
He was all dust. His eyes shone out of the dirt like frightened diamonds and it only took him two words to explain his condition.
"El Lobo," he said and pointed behind him. He went off to relieve himself against a yucca while Shorty and the others saddled up and checked their Winchesters. 
"Damn," said Shorty, cinching himself into his gear and wishing he'd paid more attention to his weapons when he should have. "I thought that sucker was supposed to be six feet under!" He took his Peacemaker from its battered holster and tried to spin the chamber. "Oh, god damn!" From one chamber he dug out a disgusting mixture of oil and hair. The gun was no better for his attention. He put it away, relying as usual on his rifle.
"I've been sayin' about that pistol," said Grumpy with deep satisfaction, swinging up alongside him. 
"You've been sayin' 'I told you so' all your life, Grumpy," says the Breed Papoose, squinting his handsome eyes to show he spoke in fun. "I'm lookin' forward to the day I take an arrow or a bullet an' find your ugly mug leanin' over me to tell me how I should've seen it comin'." And he patted his own holster. "An' when it happens, Grumpy, don't say I didn't warn you..."
Emphatically he turned down the brim of his wide Mexican sombrero and kicked his pony forward, whistling The Streets of Laredo in that ostentatious, elaborate way of his. 
Over his shoulder Charlie told them that at least one war party of Apache, employing their usual clever strategies, were maybe twenty miles off but moving in fast. He had seen two other distant war-bands and heard of more—though they could be reports of the same parties. If their leader wasn't El Lobo Blanco he had certainly convinced the Indians that he was. 
One thing was certain—they were coming together and their War Chief bore the Black Lance, the lost totem, their legendary symbol of redemption and revenge. Following this potent weapon, which was also their ginam, nothing less than an Apache army was on its way. News was that they'd already taken and gutted the Pecos Express and destroyed tramway as far as De Quincey, making it impossible for the army to bring up troops quickly.
Charlie said that the general wisdom was that the White Dogs were on the war-path again. Word was El Lobo Blanco had returned from the dead and was leading them. He had been the most feared Apache on the border—cunning, clever and almost supernaturally lucky and he had nearly destroyed the Circle Squared once before. The boys left Grumpy, Windy O'Day and Swedish Charlie to follow as rearguard and took off like bullets for the relative security of the Brady Ranch. 
The big sprawling fortified house and its various outbuildings were arranged around a good, deep well. The ranch was capable of withstanding for months anything but overwhelming numbers. Its situation, on a lush plain, gave it every advantage and it could not be taken by surprise. Tex Brady's father had built the place in the years when Indian raids were common and there was no cavalry station nearby to make a savage think twice. 
Here, single-handedly, he had defended his cabin while his wife gave birth to his son and half the Apache nation seemed to descend on them as if some instinct told the Coaxinca, the Merengo, the Kakatanawa and the Chirichaua that a great warrior was being born to the whites—a warrior who, if he survived, would become their noblest and most admired adversary! They seemed determined that he should not survive.
But survive he did—and grew to young manhood at Dulwich College in England—until recalled hastily to Texas with the news that his father was murdered and the Circle Squared Ranch possessed by Mr Paul Minct, the notorious land-grabber. That tale of vengeance, redemption and love has been told already.
Now the boys skidded in to the compound and dismounted in a storm of dust, their chaps flapping about their legs as they ran towards the big house just as Jenny Brady, Tex's beautiful and very recent bride, and Don Lorenzo, his grey-haired old mentor, came out onto the porch.
Shorty wasted no time conveying to his mistress and her friend what Swedish Charlie had conveyed to him. 
Jenny and Don Lorenzo immediately sprang into action. Barricades were raised, rifle-slits were tested, ammunition was brought out and the two Gatling guns mounted on their swivels, covering the greater part of the surrounding range while a rider was sent to Los Pinos to warn the citizens and bring the boss back.
Tex was helping out at the circuit court where his friend, the 'Prairie Green Incorruptible', Judge Abraham Peakiss, was dispensing that even-handed law which had made him the most respected authority from Galveston to Port Sabatini.
When Shorty found Tex he was about to enjoy an evening drink in the Gin-U-Wine Oyster Bar just down the street from the old French court-house. The judge was with him and so was one of the plaintiffs the judge had just fined, shaking him by the hand buying everybody a drink and thanking the old man for his verdict.
Swiftly the foreman blurted out the news. Nobody asked him to repeat himself. Judge Peakiss hurried off to send some telegrams. Captain Gideon went to order an express rider to Austin, requesting urgent reinforcements. Mayor Borden called a general town meeting. Lizzy La Paine demanded someone's protection, preferably Tex's. Sheriff Omar Hunt was at the MacGregor farm delivering the usual writ. The plaintiff goggled, turned pale and seemed to be looking around for something to kill himself with. El Lobo had that kind of credibility. 
Tex Brady ran to his hotel, grabbed up his simple kit and followed Shorty to the ostlers, where his great-hearted mare Brenda was already saddled and waiting. As always, she was eager to be off. Her ancestors had borne the chivalry of Arabia and galloped with the British at Alhambra, Bengazi and Wadi-al-Djinn. Toledo steel was in her bones. Marekshi powder was in her blood.
Soon the two cowboys were riding hell for leather across the open prairie. The only difference was that now Tex Brady wore the famous blue and red outfit with the black mask and white sombrero of his alter ego—the legendary Masked Buckaroo! His reason for donning the costume was his reputation amongst all Indians as an honest broker. It might be the edge which saved their lives. Everyone respected the Masked Buckaroo.
They used neither quirts nor spurs, simply calm, encouraging words, to maintain that wild pace. There was not a motor—steam or electric—to match them in their own element where man and mount became the same creature, thinking and acting as one. Tex's father had always maintained that justice and kindness made simple economic sense. "You get more out of an animal and more out of an Indian if you treat 'em with respect." 
A stern disciplinarian and a great patriarch, that old Cattle Baron thought cruelty made no sense at all. He had co-existed with the Indians by acknowledging their ancient rights and customs, for which they were perfectly prepared to allow him some modern rights and customs. He had no romantic notions about the kind of people they were. They saw their fundamental survival to be dependent upon their military ascendancy, their reputation as vicious conquerors. They had been practising tribal genocide as a way of life since time began.
He knew that a balance of power existed and that if he was ever at a disadvantage, depending upon their prevailing mood and practical needs, they would finish him and everyone else on his ranch. They assumed the same of him without understanding that he believed alternatives to be available.
Like the Indians, he was acting from what he took for profound moral imperatives. He did not know how much invisible power he derived, in Indian eyes, from those people in Washington he so despised. For the times, however, his views were enlightened. Behind his back, because they dare say nothing to his terrible, battle-scarred face, the other ranchers and towners had called Meredith Brady an Indian-lover. 
The mystical Secret Circle of the Kiowa Apache known as the White Dog Society had tested his sentiments. It was one of those cults which catches on and spreads from tribe to tribe faster than slurry through a swimming-hole. A desperate substitute for real power, maybe, but it causes a lot of trouble while it's running. 
The chief shaman of the White Dogs was a Kiowa Apache trouble-maker called Ulrucha-na-o, which means 'Pale Wolf' in his dialect. They believed that, as a presentiment of his coming death, a warrior saw a pale wolf following him. However, if the wolf ran ahead of him, that meant his life ran on, also, so long as he followed the wolf.
Pale Wolf's charismatic personality as much as his religious proseletising drew in bored young braves with no future and a history of defeat who believed it might be possible to drive back the whites with magic and drugs as well as courage. When Ulrucha gave the word and lifted up the Black Lance they were ready to take the war-path confident in the understanding that they were protected by powerful magic and that their weapons were equally charmed. This made them even braver and their attacks all the fiercer. And it carried the luck of the devil. For eight months they did seem to lead charmed lives, running roughshod over Texas in one last, long, cruel, spiritually-enhancing blood-letting. This seems common to the generality of religions, whose adherents justify the most elaborate horrors and torments in the promotion and establishment of their faith.
No-one called Colonel Meredith Brady an Indian-lover after he had led the war against Ulrucha and his White Dog Ghost Soldiers. The final battle between him and the fighting shaman was a proud legend amongst both peoples. Suffice to say, Ulrucha's scalp was brought back to his enemy's lodge. How Brady's son made reconciliation with the Kakatanawa Apache and became their blood-brother is another story. After it was over Tex had thought there could never be war between Apache and Texican again. Yet here was the worst news possible! 
Hours later, after some tense moments and faster than seemed physically possible, the two men reached the compound of the Circle Squared and threw themselves off their exhausted ponies, calling for hot water and fresh ammunition.
After a few moments they noted the eery silence of the ranch. Though it was evening, no lamps had been lit. From somewhere came the noises of chickens and hogs, the whicker of a horse, perhaps the sound of a hammer rising and falling, but no human voices greeted them.
It was then that Shorty silently pointed out the still, dark shape on the porch. It was the body of a black retriever. It had been shot through the eye with a white-fletched Kiowa Apache arrow.
"You ever seen that dog before, Shorty ?" murmurs Tex, putting fingers to the creature's throat.
"Nope," says Shorty. "Looks like a man's good hound dog, though."
A sharp sound from somewhere inside.
Tex Brady grew instantly alert, his hands falling onto the pearl handles of his twin revolvers.
"There's something funny going on here, Shorty," he gritted. "And I have to admit I don't like the smell of it..."

Chapter Two: The Scent Of The Wolf

AS THE TWO men listened, the slow, regular hammering continued. It was coming from the bunk house. Their guns in their fists, the young cowboys approached the big building cautiously, kicking open the doors and ducking quickly into the shadows. The noise was soon identified.
In the middle of the common room, tied to chairs which had in turn been placed on the old oaken table at the centre, were Grumpy, Pinto Pete, Windy O'Day, Swedish Charlie and The Breed Papoose. They were wearing nothing but their pink union suits, boots and hats. They were gagged. Some of the other boys were equally discommoded, lying in corners of the room. It had been The Breed Papoose who had made the noise, rapping on the table with his fancy silver boot heels.
"Somehow," said The Masked Buckaroo as his Bowie knife expertly sliced through rope and cloth, "this has none of the earmarks of an Apache raid."
"What about the arrow ?" Shorty said. "That looks and smells right."
But Tex said nothing, merely frowning as he thought the problem over.
He would make no judgements until he had heard the boys out.

WINDY O'DAY, TEX'S oldest sidekick and confidant, told what had happened.
Not four hours after the hands had ridden in to the Circle Squared the entire ranch-house and its outbuildings had been surrounded by shadowy Apache riders who arrived with the dusk. 
"It was right spooky," said the fungus-faced oldster, rubbing at his wrists and ankles and glancing around at his companions for confirmation of his view, "like they was dead. Not a sound out of any of 'em, and all kinda glowin' with that faint, silvery light."
"Natural phosphorescent paint found in the Guadalupe Mountains of New Mexico can give that effect. It is a favorite warpaint of the Kakatanawa Apache and is said to scare the bejeezus out of their enemies." The Masked Buckaroo helped Windy outside to his usual rocking chair. 
"Well, boss, I guess it scared the wixwax out of us, too," said Windy philosophically, "because we was impressed. Especially when they didn't attack. They seemed to be darin' us to shoot at 'em. This stand-off went on for a couple of hours and then they kinda faded back into the darkness. We didn't feel too easy about this and were waiting for their next trick when this mist came up, all of a sudden, and we heard this single voice calling against a wild wind. My blood ran colder than a Wyomin' weasel..."
"He's right, boss," confirmed the usually-sceptical Pinto Pete. "It did things to yore insides, that singin'."
"Couldn't have been worse than Windy's yodelling." Shorty winked at his old friend.
"Come to think of it, it did sound a little bit familiar!" The Breed Papoose joined in the fun.
"Well," said Windy, "I don't know about the rest of you boys, but I was barely in control of my bowels or my bladder."
Suddenly sober, the experienced old hands nodded their agreement. The scene, the noise, the fog had all combined to terrify them and somehow blind them to the fact that the Indians were sneaking into the compound, weaving in with the mist, getting through the doors and taking over the entire ranch without a single blow falling or a shot fired. When the boys got a hold of themselves again, they found Miss Jenny and Don Lorenzo in the hands of the Apache and they were tied up, sitting on a table. There appeared to have been no time passed between the events. They did not feel they had slept or that they had been drugged.
"It was more like a dream," said Grumpy, after some thought. "Like magic might be..."
"Yet it didn't seem bad or crazy, did it ?" said Pinto Pete. "We weren't threatened..."
"They took Jenny and Don Lorenzo," said the young vigilante very quietly, his steel-blue eyes glittering behind his mask. "I would call that an act of aggression, I think."
"They didn't seem scared, either," offered Windy. "And I can always tell, boss, when Miss Jenny's scared."
This set the Masked Buckaroo to thinking for a moment. Then he was forced to put intellectual speculation behind him and turn to more pressing action. The Indians had been gone only three or four hours and had left a substantial trail, heading South West, towards the U.S. border. The Buckaroo had no trouble following. Not for nothing was he respected by the Kakatanawa as 'Pa-ne-e-ha-ska-na-o-nee-pa-no-sta' or Sniffing Dog.
"They have made no attempt to hide their trail. This in itself is significant," said the Buckaroo, reining in on a bluff as a vast, bloody sunset turned them all into black silhouettes and the yellow sky darkened against the blue of the night to reveal the silver wash of stars. He pushed back his sombrero and brushed dust from his face. "They mean for us to follow them."
As soon as his loyal riders were gathered around him the Masked Buckaroo explained his strategy. They would camp here for the night, but the two men with the freshest mounts would ride out before dawn racing for Port Sabatini via San Antonio with all the information Colonel R.G. 'Thunderclap' Meadley could be given. Once they had delivered their messages to Colonel Meadley in San Antonio they would then ride to see Captain Blackgallon Jones, the Welsh Engineer, and hand over the remaining documents. 
"The army has some of the best modern inventions at its disposal," the Buckaroo assured his audience. "The wild Indian of today has little chance against such resources. Now we shall see how Texas's investment in modern transport and communications pays off.
"But meanwhile," he reminded his listeners, his voice growing deeper and sterner and his fists hardening about Brenda's reins, "my wife and oldest friend are prisoners of these mysterious 'Ghost Warriors' and my guess is they're luring us into a trap."
"But why?" The Breed Papoose had already dismounted and was lifting the saddle off his tired bronc. "They could've taken us all at the ranch. They only had to wait for you, Buckaroo."
"That's what's puzzlin' me," admitted the young vigilante, "and that ain't the only thing. There's a whole lot to this affair which stinks higher than a Pecos fish pond in summertime. No Apache I ever came across behaved like these hombres. Sarajevo, did you ever get to see any of the atrocities you heard they'd committed?"
Sarajevo removed his battered sombrero and scratched his head. "I can't say I did, boss."
"And did you meet anyone who had seen anything at first hand?"
Sarajevo frowned and thought back carefully. After a while he shook his head. "Nope."
"What are you drivin' at boss?" the Papoose wanted to know.
But the young rancher was not yet ready to speak. While the others made camp, he took his portable writing kit from his saddle-bags and penned messages to the necessary personnel. This done, he sealed each envelope, then stretched out with his head on his saddle to sleep. 
The Buckaroo was up before his companions, waking them to the smell of fresh coffee on a boisterous fire. Soon Windy had unlimbered his pans and provisions and was preparing the hearty breakfast all the boys looked forward to when on the trail. Then messengers were despatched, full of ham, eggs, beans and java, riding like the wind, and the Buckaroo issued instructions to his remaining men.
Soon the little party on the bluff was reduced by a further two. As the sun rose into a blue, misty sky and moonhawks sailed far overhead, the Masked Buckaroo, and his loyal companion Windy O'Day, continued on the trail the Apache had left for them. Tex knew he was taking a chance, but he was a natural born gambler. He was staking not only his own life and that of his companion—he was staking the liberty and well-being of his wife and mentor.
Soon the two partners were the only moving objects to be seen for scores of miles in that bleak landscape on which the sun fell with savage intensity, casting the long shadows of cactus and jebediah-tree across the stirring dirt. Yet the Apache trail was impossible to lose.
"They've driven a highway for us," said Windy, still puzzled. He was used to having a harder time than this tracking Apache. "Is this a band sent to draw us off while something bigger happens somewhere else ?"
"I've allowed for the possibility, Windy," the Buckaroo reassured the old-timer. "As I've suggested, modern communications coupled with the most up-to-date transport systems should solve that particular problem. But the mystery remains—why and where are they leading us and for what purpose ?"
"Maybe just one of their devilish tricks," suggested Windy. "Who can figure what goes on in the head of an Apache?"
"I guess I can usually take a pretty good guess," Tex answered modestly. He had, after all, lived the life of an Apache brave and gone through the harshest trials of manhood to the approval of his blood-brothers. In other words, Tex could think like an Indian. This affair, however, baffled him.
An hour later they arrived at the Telegraph Station to find it a gutted, smouldering shell. The wires had been cut and used to bind the operator and his wife. The couple had been laid across the nearby tram-tracks which had been dynamited and were unuseable from this point on. Their personal property had been removed from the station and piled nearby on the line, as if the thief had ridden off in haste.
As the Buckaroo swung out of his saddle and stopped to cut the man and woman free he looked meaningly at Windy. "Ever hear of the Apache doing this?" he asked.
Windy scratched at his tangled beard and frowned hugely. "Can't say I ever did, boss."
The telegraph operator was, as so many in his profession, a mute, but his pretty and agreeable young wife spoke enough for both of them. Not that she had any clear idea what had happened to her. The Indians had turned up out of nowhere and surrounded the station. "They just sat there on their ponies, staring in at us." They had the look of ghosts, she said, but she guessed they were wearing some kind of warpaint. Their leader carried a massive black-bladed war-lance and had, she would swear, the eyes of the devil—"Red and glaring like the fires of hell!" She blushed and apologised for her language.
"Ma'am," said the Buckaroo quietly. "There are some experiences which call for strong language. I suspect this is one of them. What happened next?"
She was not sure. She spoke of a silvery mist growing so thick that it entered the cabin. In some way she could not quite remember the Apache had entered the station. The chief had spoken a few words, but she had not understood them. The sound was awful. It made something inside her head hurt.
She had been lying on the tracks, watching the fire, before she realised what had happened to them. Although she was unable to remember the events, it did not seem to her that they had ever actually occurred. It was, she said, as if certain things had simply not happened.
"As if Time itself had been cut up at random and then put back together again with pieces missing?" suggested the Masked Buckaroo.
"Exactly," she gasped. "How did you know ?"
But the young Texan did not reply. His mind was elsewhere. He was trying to recall a book he had read long ago while at school in England. The book had been in old German and had been given to him to study. But he had become fascinated by its arguments and its odd narrative. There was something about this business which reminded him of that book, but he could not think what.
Remembering his manners, the Buckaroo touched his gloved hand to his hat. "Just a hunch, really," he answered. "Well, ma'am, we're expecting a track-mendin' team along soon. I don't expect you'll be bothered by the Apache again. Are you willin' to wait here until the army arrives ?"
"Since your trail clearly leads after the Indians," she said, "I think I would prefer to await the army." She went to help her balding, red-faced little husband to his feet. She dusted at him vaguely with a cloth. Beaming, he accepted this attention as a show of affection.
"Excellent!" exclaimed the young Texan, taking out his writing set. "I will leave a message with you. It can be despatched as soon as Colonel Meadley's 'Flyin' Tracklayers' arrive and fix everything up."
Clearly delighted that the famously romantic old soldier was on his way, the woman accepted the envelope the Buckaroo handed her.
A moment later Tex was mounted again. Brenda's forelegs stamped against the air. She was impatient to be off. 
"Good luck, Buckaroo!" The woman waved with the envelope as Tex and Windy disappeared rapidly in a dust-cloud of their own making.
 
Chapter Three: The English Detective
 
HOURS LATER, AFTER following a waddy for a few miles, they found themselves in semi-desert, with nothing but the jaspers, mesquite and tumbleweed for company. In the far distance was a scattering of bluffs while even further away they made out the faint, blue outline of a mountain range. They reined in to take stock of the trail. It looked as if the Indians were heading for the mountains. There was still daylight left and they determined to press on while they could.
Windy O'Day was uncertain, however. "What if these redskins are leading us off so they can do something really bad?" he proposed.
"I have sent the appropriate messages, Windy." The Buckaroo brandished a grey glove he had discovered on the trail. "This means they're leading us to Jenny," he said. "And, old pard, that's all I reckon I care about just now..."
It was not a sentiment Windy could disagree with.
He was about to reply when a voice sounded behind them, startling them both.
Tex whirled in his saddle, his fingers falling to the handles of his revolvers. Then he relaxed, laughing.
"There's only one hombre could sneak up on The Masked Buckaroo like that," he said with admiring respect as he stuck out his hand and addressed the newcomer. "And that's Sir Seaton Begg! Good evening, my old friend. What brings you to this part of the prairie?"
It was indeed the famous English detective, who had last worked with The Masked Buckaroo on the exhilarating Case of the Glass of Armadillo when the two lawmen had joined forces to solve a particularly sticky mystery and rounded up some pretty ornery hombres in the process. 
Sir Seaton was dressed for the bush, with a wide-brimmed hat, hunting whites and a voluminous dust-coat. His horse was a sturdy black Arab. In her long holsters were two rifles—a Winchester and a Purdy's—and the rest of the detective's simple kit was rolled behind the saddle. He himself was a man in middle-years, lean and fit and with an alertness of bearing which might have belonged to a much younger individual. His aquiline features emphasised the eagle-sharpness of his grey-blue eyes, displaying a superb intelligence—one that for many years had been used to singular effect against the criminal fraternity.
"I picked you up a couple of hours ago," the detective told his friend. "And because I couldn't initially be sure it was you, I took my time before revealing myself. Besides, I rather enjoyed the fun of wondering when you'd spot me."
"I couldn't want a better companion in this escapade," declared the young Buckaroo. "But what are you doing here, Sir Seaton, if I might ask?"
"I would guess it is what you are doing," the detective replied. "I am on the trail of a first-class trouble-maker."
"Would he be known by any chance in these parts as Pale Wolf?" asked the Buckaroo.
"That is not the name by which he is most familiar to me," declared the detective, "but I am aware of it. What is your business with him?"
Laconically, the Masked Buckaroo recounted the events of the last couple of days.
As they continued to ride, Sir Seaton took out his big onyx pipe and packed it full of his favourite M&E. Soon the surrounding air was filled with the wonderful smell of aromatic ope. 
"It certainly doesn't sound like Apaches," interrupted Windy, after the Buckaroo had finished his tale.
"Well, I think you'll find Apaches are involved." Sir Seaton gestured with the pipe. "And perhaps more than you have bargained for. You are right, however, in suggesting that these are not Apache tactics. They are, in fact, the tactics of the man I seek."
"And who is that?" Tex squinted his eyes against the darkling sky. It was no longer possible to see the range, but the buttes stood black and tall with the sun behind them.
"I am not sure he has a name you would recognise, Tex," said Sir Seaton. "Save one, of course. His Kakatanawa Apache name."
"Lib-nu-pa-na-da?"
"He is called that in many languages. I mean the name he has adopted."
"Ulrucha?"
"Just so. For it is not his true name. He adopted it from the first Ulrucha—the man your father fought so long ago. That man was killed in a famous duel."
"I know the story," said the Buckaroo, "and I've seen the evidence for it. Ulrucha's long, white scalp hung in my father's smoking shed for a number of years. Until I gave it back to the Apache."
"You gave it back? Aha!"
It was growing too dark to ride and the three riders headed for a sheltered gulch, making camp some distance from the water and preparing the surrounding ground against the mob of varmints which would be attracted to them in the night. Windy O'Day had soon cooked up a tasty meal and they ate in silence for a while, looking up at the bright stars and listening to the distant song of the coyotes.
"There's nothing like a night spent under the stars in the American wilderness," said Sir Seaton offering his pouch of M&E to his friends. 
They agreed enthusiastically as they packed their pipes.
Soon all three men were smoking thoughtfully, their eyes on imagined scenes, as they considered their situation.
After some time, Windy spoke. "I reckon they ain't hostiles at all," he said. "Not in the regular sense, anyway."
"Your instincts are perfect as always, Windy," said Sir Seaton. "How do you explain their apparent ability to make themselves invisible?"
"Indians believe they're invisible. Sometimes that's enough, they're so tricky at not being seen, anyway." But even Windy realised his explanation did not fit the stories they had heard—let alone his own experience. "I just can't see how they slipped past us. Hardly a man in the bunkhouse ain't an experienced Injun fighter—and Don Lorenzo knows more about Apache than Geronimo. Yet we wasn't drugged. Unless there was somethin' in that smoke. How could so many get past us?"
"It might not have been many. One, with the appropriate skills, would be sufficient. It's an old trick," Sir Seaton spoke almost abstractedly, his mind elsewhere. "Almost a favourite, I'd say."
"You mean you know how it was done, Sir Seaton?" Tex wanted to know.
"I believe I do, Tex. Indeed it is his timeless method. That isn't the mystery. What interests me is how he was able to employ it here."
"Were we drugged, Sir Seaton?" asked Windy, his whiskers bristling.
"Not exactly, Windy. We are dealing with forces which don't need to slip anyone a mickey finn in order to do their work. You may think me mad or worse, gentlemen, but I believe we are dealing with nothing less than the supernatural!"
"You mean we really are fightin' ghosts!" Windy's eyebrows leapt to join his unruly mop of grey hair.
"After a fashion." Sir Seaton fell again into a thoughtful silence, unable or unwilling to answer Windy's many questions. 
Tex, too, said nothing, but stared into the heart of the fire. It was clear to Windy that his mind was not on supernatural speculation but on the fate of his beautiful young wife, Jenny. It was not the Buckaroo's way to make much of his personal fears, but there was no doubt he was in an agony of anxiety.
A little later, when the moon came out and turned the whole prairie into a silver fantasy, Sir Seaton got up. They saw him sit down on a rock to inflate an Association soccer ball. When they finally put their heads to their saddles, Sir Seaton was still out there amongst the cactus and the jerrymanda punting the ball expertly through the assymetric goal-posts formed by an ancient yucca, muttering to himself, making complicated, almost mystical passes with the ball and puffing periodically on his vast pipe.
THEY WERE UP again before dawn and on the trail, with Tex leading the way. He was even more anxious than before to catch up with the men who had captured his wife. For the first time since he had set out in pursuit he was beginning to wonder if he would ever see her again. 
Sir Seaton apologised if he had disturbed them with his activities. "I have a rule about exercise," he said. "Especially when I need to think something over. And, of course, usually I have a rod with me. But here—" With a helpless gesture he indicated the dusty, waterless plain over which they rode.
The mountains were now clearly distinguishable. The ancient, eroded peaks glowed like copper in the sunlight. They were the most south-easterly tip of the Nova Guadalupes, close to where they joined the Guadalupes proper.
As they rode, Sir Seaton explained what had brought him to this bleak plain.
Called upon to investigate the third theft of the Fellini Chalice, otherwise known as the Garth Cup, this time from the rooms of his own brother-in-law, the detective had uncovered an extraordinary story which had already brought him face to face with the Gateshead Leopard Men and the lost tin-miners of Cornwall, had him crawling through an endless succession of tunnels, storm-water drains, deep galleries, shafts and corridors in pursuit of his quarry. "For most of my recent experiences, I must say, have taken place underground! A week ago you would have found me sailing the five great subterranean canals which meet at the Quai D'Hivers in Paris. It was rather a relief to take the express zeppelin to Austin and then ride alone under these wide skies."
"What led you to Texas?" asked the Masked Buckaroo leaning to rebuckle a strap. 
"That's a very long story indeed," Sir Seaton told him. "Suffice to say I am on the trail of the one who has been called Pale Wolf by the Apache. I believe he has gained possession of the Garth Cup and means to use it in a ceremony intended to increase the power of Chaos in our world!"
"Are we talkin' Loo-cif-her, here," Windy wanted to know.
"If you like," said the English detective. 
The old-timer shuddered. "I can take pretty near anything the Apache think up," he said, "but when it comes to devils an' ghosts, sir, I am not your man. I guess my brain don't believe in such things. But my feet never seem to listen to my brain."
Sir Seaton clapped a friendly hand upon the old man's shoulder. "Don't worry, Windy. You shan't be called upon to deal with the supernatural. That's my business, I'm afraid."
"I ain't sure I'm much better at handling that stuff than Windy," said the Buckaroo doubtfully. "I must admit in my wildest dreams I didn't really believe old Ulrucha was a ghost!"
"He is not a ghost," Sir Seaton declared quietly. "I assure you, Tex, he is something far more powerful and terrifying than that."
With a grim, distant expression, he urged his horse into a gallop and for a while raced ahead of his companions, lost in the contemplation of his own terrifying knowledge.

Chapter Four: The Will Of The Wolf

THE THREE ADVENTURERS dismounted at the mouth of a towering canyon and looked in awe at the strange red limestone formations all around them. The Apache trail led relentlessly to this spot—and into the depths of the canyon. What Tex and his friends had to work out now was the kind of trap it was...
Although Tex's every instinct was to ride like fury into the canyon and with both guns blazing rescue his wife, he knew that he must continue to use his brains and self-control if he was going to get Jenny free.
High overhead, suddenly came the thin whine of an aero-engine. Glancing upward they saw the dark blue and gold hull of a Texan flying battle-cruiser easing herself over a mountain peak and hovering above them. 
This was all Tex needed to see. While Sir Seaton took out his pocket holograph and exchanged messages with the ship, he removed his Winchester from its scabbard and checked the rifle's action.
"Are we ready, Tex?" Windy wanted to know. He squared his shoulders, ready to face the Devil himself if necessary but not looking forward to the prospect.
"We sure are, Windy," declared the young cowboy. "But you ain't comin' with us, pard. I need you here to signal."
After a quick word of explanation, the Masked Buckaroo shook hands with the old-timer, grinned his famous go-to-hell grin, loosened his twin guns in their holsters, and galloped to ride side by side with Sir Seaton Begg into the shadows of the vast canyon.
The silence was profound. All the men heard was the creak of their own harness, the sound of hoofs thudding with relentless rhythm into the soft sand of the canyon bottom. Very evidently, many horses had recently come this way.
"I would guess there's maybe fifty warriors," Tex suggested, at Sir Seaton's question. "And then there's captives, maybe loot. The waggons aren't too heavily loaded and the horses pulling them are fresh enough. If I was readin' these signs as I usually would, I'd say it was a whole tribe, or at least a big village, on the move. Has he got his women and children with him, do you think ?"
"Not his," said Sir Seaton.
Tex shuddered.

THE CANYON GREW steeper, taller and and darker, and still the two men rode steadily on until at last they came to a place where the high limestone walls widened into a rough circle and light from above poured down to give the effect of a single beam focussed on the center of the clearing.
The shadows were full of restless shapes. Tex could smell them all around him, but he did not reveal this. He looked steadily ahead, into the pool of light, into which three figures now moved, as if they had been waiting for him.
The first was his beloved wife, Jenny, clearly unhurt and not especially frightened. The second was his wise old friend Don Lorenzo, his sombrero brim turned down against the blazing sunshine. And the third was a thin, muscular figure in an Apache breechclout and bolero jacket, far taller than the average Indian, whose skin had a strange silvery tinge so that Tex's first thought was 'the man's a leper!' From a long, tapering, handsome skull stared two dark, crimson eyes which seemed to burn with fire so ancient it had petrified. And slung over his back was a monstrous war-lance, bigger than any Comanche weapon, with a wide blade of black iron burned with a pattern of writhing ruby-red heiroglyphs in no language either man recognised, perhaps some ancient semitic alphabet. The man stared at them with a haughty, almost bored expression. It was as if his chief attention was elsewhere, as if those strange eyes stared into another world than this.
Tex was immediately struck by the air of melancholy which exuded from the warrior. He had the manner of someone who had lived for ten thousand years or more and had seen nothing to confirm any faith he might ever had had in the world's improvement.

SIR SEATON BEGG rested in his saddle, his arms folded over his pommel, his reins loose in his hands. "Good afternoon, your highness," he said sardonically.
The Apache leader turned his head to regard Begg and his eyes seemed to narrow in a smile. "So you have found me, Sir Seaton. I had not expected to see you so soon."
"Always a pleasure." Begg took his pipe and baccy from his coat and offered the pouch to Pale Wolf who shook his head, declining gracefully. As the detective filled his bowl and lit the mixture, puffing luxuriously, Tex could contain himself no longer.
"I need to know, sir," he said to the War Chief, "if my wife and friend are your prisoner."
"No longer," said the Apache chief. "They are free from this moment. They have served their turn."
"And what turn was that, sir?" demanded Jenny sharply, moving rapidly to her husband's side. He dismounted to embrace her. Thankfully he shook hands with Don Lorenzo. "You were never clear on the issue, even the other evening, at dinner."
Pale Wolf smiled wistfully at this. "I apologise," he said. "My problem is not that I lie, but that the truth is unacceptable to most people. Sometimes it is impossible to disguise or even modify."
He spoke a melodic, vibrant, faintly-accented English which made it immediately clear how he could lead so many young warriors by the power of his words alone.
Then the great black war-lance was in his hands and the red engravings seemed to come alive within the metal, reflecting his blazing, ruby eyes, giving his face the sheen of a silver mask.
"Let us finish this," he said. 
And then he smiled.

Chapter Five: Apache Dreams

AS THE STRANGE albino lifted the war-lance to strike, the Masked Buckaroo pushed Jenny behind him and lifted one gloved hand.
From somewhere high above came the familiar notes of a Texan Cavalry cornet calling a complicated 'Alert'. The sound seemed to go on forever and the young vigilante looked on in astonishment as the silver-faced warrior threw back his long head, the white hair cascading and curling about his shoulders, to howl in sudden, impossible unison with the bugle's call.
Next, the black blade itself began to vibrate and moan. It issued that hideous crooning sound others had reported, making it almost impossible to hold down the contents of the stomach. Yet gradually the pitch changed until it, too, sang in unison with the other voices. 
It was as if Pale Wolf had planned everything for this moment.
From out of the shadows now came a small, crooked individual, carrying a great jewelled chalice which, once the light from above touched it, also began to vibrate and sing in harmony with the bugle, the sword and the man.
From somewhere above a voice was calling—perhaps a warning—but those in the canyon did not hear. Their attention was on the scene taking place under that concentrated beam of sunlight where a bizarre silver-skinned warrior in the full war-gear of a Kakatanawa Apache raised his voice in unnatural, inhuman music, performing a ritual which none doubted to be of the darkest, most powerful magic. Then, as the echo of the bugle began to fade, the albino brought the great, black blade down into the rock at his feet, his voice rising in hideous crescendo as the chalice held by the dwarf seemed to swell and shatter and the blade bit down into the ground, splitting it wide and revealing a great opening in the darkness, a natural stairway leading into the unknown.
And out of this sudden fissure came a deep, suffering groan, as if Mother Earth herself stirred in her sleep, dreaming of all the evil her children had done. And none there dared imagine what kind of creature bore such pain or uttered such sounds.

IT WAS SIR Seaton Begg who took the initiative. He stepped to the opening and stared down into it, frowning.
Behind him, Pale Wolf smiled. "So you have lost none of your courage, old enemy."
"Should I be afraid?" Sir Seaton looked up and met the Apache leader's strange eyes directly.
Pale Wolf shrugged. "I suppose not."
"I must credit you with excellent strategy," Begg said. "You have completely outmaneuvered us in the best traditions of Apache generals! You guessed how young Tex here would act and think. You put yourself in his shoes, how he would cover all possible eventualities, leaving as little as possible to chance—because his wife's very soul could be at stake. You knew he would find a way to get the army here and that's exactly what he did..."
Pale Wolf reached into his breech-clout and removed a compact silver case. From this he took a small, brown cigarette and placed it between his lips. He lit it with a match and drew deeply of the dark smoke. He appeared to have nothing to do in the world, but listen in a relaxed, easy posture, as Sir Seaton Begg continued:
"You didn't want Jenny Brady or Don Lorenzo or even Tex himself. You were using Tex's brains to make sure the army would be here at a certain moment. And you didn't really want the army. You wanted the army trumpeteer, that wonderful cornet which, of all the armies in the world, only the Texas Cavalry boasts. You did not really want the trumpeteer. You wanted his cornet. Or rather, you wanted a particular sequence of notes on that cornet, which occurs in the formal 'Alert' blown by Texas's bravest. And it had to sound at a particular moment, when the light fell in a certain way and when man, chalice and blade could give voice together, casting the great spell which would open the doorway you needed into the Realm Below."
At this, the albino's eyes narrowed. His handsome features seem to contain a strange, bitter amusement. His long-fingered hands, the colour of bone, played with the ornate red shaft of the lance. "I believe I have underestimated you, however, Seaton Begg. For I did not anticipate your presence here. Neither did I prepare for it. Neither was I aware of your knowledge."
"Acquired in the course of a long investigation," murmured the detective. "I have been seeking you and the chalice for some while. Since you stole it from Sir John Soanes' Museum three years ago. The Museum of which my brother-in-law is director."
The albino seemed surprised and made as if to deny the charge, then shrugged and pulled deeply on his aromatic cigarette.
"Well, Sir Seaton, you could easily have thwarted me, it seems. Yet you did not. Why so?"
Begg pursed his lips and frowned, as if he had not considered the question before. At length he said: "Curiosity, I suppose. Which is, after all, my abiding and defining vice."
"Then I am obliged to you," said the albino, swinging the now dormant blade onto his back and signalling to the people in the shadows.
Now, as they emerged, Tex saw that they were emaciated creatures, pale from every deprivation. Tex thought one thing when he saw them—'Reservation Indian'. Their undernourished bodies spoke of terrible hardship. Only their eyes were vital and, as they began to ride and walk slowly down the causeway into the earth, they bore themselves with a strange, new self-respect. Men, women and children, waggons and horses, moved slowly down into the darkness, their voices ringing with wonder and fresh confidence so that those above ground almost felt envious of them and what they were seeing.
"You mean, Pale Wolf, that you made such an elaborate plan simply in order to save those poor creatures?" gasped Jenny.
"I am not so altruistic, Mrs Brady," said the albino with an ironic glint in his strange, red eyes. "But I guessed my self-interest would combine with theirs to our mutual benefit and so it proved." 
"Where are they going?" Don Lorenzo asked.
"Home," said the albino tossing the remains of his cigarette into the shadows. "Home to the land of lost nations, of recollected pride and purpose. Home to the Reforgotten. Home to the Realm Below." His eyes met those of his old adversary. "Would you deny them that peace of mind, Seaton Begg? That pride?"
The English detective took an interest in his pipe. "My question has always been, your highness, whether you would deny me my peace of mind in achieving yours. It is the great fundamental debate. How do we achieve satisfactory compromise?"
"They intend you no harm," insisted the albino. "And as for myself, I believe you know how deeply uninterested I am in your race and its ambitions. As long as I am left alone."
"Left alone to murder and steal, sir." Sir Seaton Begg reminded the strange creature. "Why, you have killed half the British parliament! Lady Rhatchet herself dropped dead merely at the sight of you! While this made you something of a popular hero, you are still guilty. You have stolen one of our great treasures and apparently destroyed it. You have put everyone, moreover, to a considerable outlay of time, concern and money which could have been better spent elsewhere. Sir, the rogue wolf is left alone only when he hunts in his own territory. I cannot believe you to be unaware of the fallacious nature of your arguments. You have not left us alone, sir."
At which a deep sigh escaped the albino's lips and he glared around impatiently. "Am I to be forever plagued by dullards and fools splitting hairs in abstract arguments? I am tired of the abstract, gentlemen. How I long for the concrete."
"I can offer you as much concrete, sir, as you please," said Sir Seaton Begg. "Her Majesty's prisons consist of little else."
The albino turned brooding eyes upward, studying the tiny figures who now rimmed the canyon. He spoke dreamily. "Did you bring the entire Texas army here, Mr Brady? I am flattered. Please give Captain Gideon my compliments and tell him I shall have to meet him another time."
With that he had mounted his pony and, without looking back, urged it at a rapid trot down into the fissure.
A few moments later they heard his laughter issue from the echoing depths. The caverns enlarged and expanded it, giving it a rich, eternal bitterness so that it seemed Satan himself addressed them in tones full of tormented melancholy and longing.
"Farewell, old friend! We shall meet soon enough, no doubt, in the Realm Below."
And then he was gone.
A MOMENT LATER a thin voice from the heights called down:
"Could someone let us know what's happening?"
Tex recognised the voice of his friend Captain James Gideon. 
"All's well down here, Captain Gideon," he shouted back, and the echo continued 'giddy-on, giddy-on, giddy-on...' until it was spent.
Sir Seaton Begg continued to stare thoughtfully down into the fissure. 
"Are you planning to follow them, Sir Seaton?" asked the young vigilante, half-joking.
"Not immediately," replied the detective, "though it is my duty. I know my limitations. I lack certain fundamental equipment. I have no instinct for the underworld." He took a long pull on his pipe. "Yet that creature, that demon, as some believe him to be, can negotiate the most alien landscapes without any hesitation. He has that ability to sense routes and avenues which you and I could never find, even with maps. He is not the only one of his family to have that talent, of course. But it is why he can so easily pass between one realm and another. Few possess such skills."
"But what is he?" Jenny Brady wanted to know.
"They are sometimes called 'eternals'," the detective replied slowly, "and they are able to walk the roads between the worlds. The entire multiverse is theirs, yet some of them are still prisoners, still victims of their own stories."
"I am really not quite following this, Sir Seaton," said Jenny.
The detective gestured with his reins. "That is why, dear Mrs Brady, I make so few attempts to offer explanations. It is nothing to do, I assure you, with your intelligence. Your intelligence, as you know, is extraordinarily high. But there are some things about our realities which only a certain number of people seem to be able to comprehend. And there is no persuading them. They simply cannot see what I see or indeed what that poor white-faced creature who has just left us can see."
"I do not believe I would want to see what he sees," said Don Lorenzo, lightening the atmosphere a little. "Especially at this moment."
"Oh, my dear sir," said Seaton Begg feelingly, "you do not know the beauty he experiences as he wanders the impossible caverns of the Grey Fees where the organic and supernatural infrastructure of the planet intertwine. He will see gorgeous jewelled halls so high and vast that twenty great cities stand in them, each upon a peak, high above the mercury rivers and bronze mists of the valleys which draw their light from phosphorescent rain dripping steadily from the distant roofs, making fresh formations everywhere, through which move the native folk of the Grey Fees, the Offmoo, so tall and thin and silent, drifting like phantoms through their whispering rock forests and jangling crystal gardens, practising their rituals and legalities with obsessive, mindless insistence. And you have not heard the great natural organs playing. That is when all the cities make music at the same time and dying travellers come from thousands of miles to spend their last ecstatic hours borne upon so many wonderfully weaving melodies. There is no music more sophisticated nor more moving."
"Then should we not follow him this minute?" said Don Lorenzo a little drily. "Who could resist such a paradise?"
But Seaton Begg shook his head, refusing levity. "It remains, for all that," he said, "an alien paradise. It is an alternative. The Realm Below is a compendium of lost dreams. All the defeated people arrive there, vowing return, revenge and those other satisfactions with which we seem to perpetuate our miseries. But when they have been there for some time they become infected with a peculiar sadness. It is Pierrot's world, after all, without sunlight. That melancholy is characteristic of almost every denizen of the Realm Below. They live, they flourish, they have pride and their achievements are spectacular. 
"The great American civilisations are there, as well as the African, the Indian, even the Etruscan. For the Realm Below is where the defeated know triumph, where the disenfranchised and the marginilised find renewed power, where noble memory is made concrete. Where justice exists. Yet all but the Offmoo know that they are not native to the Realm, that they are forever exiled."
They were riding back up the canyon now. They could hear military voices raised in command, the busy clatter of equipment.
"Do none of them ever yearn to return?" Jenny asked the detective.
"Some dream of it. Some even make plans for conquest of the Realm Above. But that pervasive melancholy usually informs their decisions. It is hard to make war while enjoying such emotions. They compensate for their lack of martial vigor by aspiring to a high standard of civilisation."
     
NOW THEY HAD reached the canyon's mouth again. The first person lthey saw was Windy O'Day, his whiskers bristling with anxiety. He sat his horse expectantly, counting the riders as they emerged and brightening as soon as he saw their faces. Behind him now it was possible to see the practical magic Tex had worked, enabling Captain Gideon to get to the canyon hours ahead of the Apaches and position his men.
Nothing would have been possible, of course, without Colonel Meadley's famous 'Flying Tracklayers' who had laid a temporary bed across the prairie, enabling Captain Blackgallon Jones to bring up his mighty double-decker war-trams loaded with men and ordnance. These so-called 'gun-tubs' with their electric gatlings could be of spectacular effect in plains conditions and had been employed to full effect at the Battle of El Paso against what Texas still insisted on calling The Yankee Threat.
Express trams had transported the cavalry and now Captain Gideon's battle-hardened squadrons lined every vantage point of the surrounding country!
This vast display of military co-ordination brought a small smile to Sir Seaton's lips as he looked around him. He was too well-bred to observe what his companions also understood, that it had taken a great deal of organisation and a great many men to ensure that a certain cornet note sounded at a certain moment in the wilds of the New Guadalupe mountains! 
Two master-strategists had, for a short time, joined in a game whose rules were known only to one of them. Pale Wolf had used the Masked Buckaroo's famous strategic skills for his own purposes.
"I first smelled a rat," he said, "when I felt for that dog's pulse. That animal had died of natural causes. The arrow had been shot into it much later. Did you notice that no-one was killed in those 'raids'. Nobody was even seriously hurt." The Buckaroo could only admire the way in which he had been tricked.
He was not sure, however, how he was going to explain it all to Captain Gideon and his men.
As if he had had the same thought, Sir Seaton Begg leaned across in his saddle and murmured: "Remember what Pale Wolf said about not lying—that people usually refused the truth?"
The young vigilante nodded.
"Well," continued Sir Seaton, "I think we had best not explain all the details of how your dear ones were restored to you and what happened to Ulrucha and his miserable band."
Tex was inclined to agree with him.
"But first," he said, "you must tell me something about that queer fellow, Pale Wolf. He's clearly not an Indian. He's definitely a white man. But he didn't look much like an average white, either. What is he, some kind of cross?"

"HE IS AT once the last and the first of his race," said Seaton Begg. "I should perhaps explain that he is a relative of mine. We have ancestors in common. The family is from Germany. They are the von Beks of Bek, in Saxony.The family is better known, however, in neighbouring Waldenstein. Most of its sons spent more time abroad in Mirenburg, which is the capital of of Waldenstein, with whom they are identified. They intermarried with the local aristocracy and share an intimate history with the place. The man you met is Ulrich, Prince of Mirenburg, Count of Bek, who carries the ancient curse of the Bek blood..."
"Curse? More melodrama?" said Tex, almost wearily, but the Englishman ignored him.
"Every few generations they give birth to an albino. Every few centuries they give birth to identical albino twins. And about every five hundred years they give birth to albino twins who are a girl and a boy. When that occurs there is a certain stir created in the occult world. A proliferation of magical swords is one phenomenon associated with such a birth."
"What are they?" asked Don Lorenzo in some distaste. "Vampires? Werewolves? What?"
"Some of them, as I said, are called 'eternals'. They live according to different rules and conditions, but few have sinister ambitions where we are concerned. Indeed, they are often fairly altruistic. No others possess the warlock's powers you saw demonstrated just now. But 'Monsieur Zodiac', as that individual sometimes styles himself, is a master of magic, though his familiars are not always available to him here. His mind holds ancient secrets. His regular companions are the restlessly damned, the dispossessed, the abnormal. He consorts with criminals in the lowest dens of vice. And he plays the violin like an angel. No, Don Lorenzo, this is not an ordinary monster. Neither, in the usual sense, is he damned. I expect to meet him again. And when I do, I hope I shall have the luck to best him. Even extraordinary monsters, my dear sir, have no place in decent society."
"Which is why they deserve the freedom of the wild underworld at least," said the Masked Buckaroo with some feeling. He had been thinking over those events. "I propose we should leave them alone. Why pursue them, Sir Seaton?"
The detective sighed. "Monsieur Zodiac'—or Pale Wolf as you know him—is a criminal. It is my duty to bring him to justice. And that means I must follow him wherever he hides."
The Englishman rode over to have a word with Captain Gideon. The officer issued instructions and soon several saddle-bags had been handed over to Sir Seaton. He rode back, lifting his hat to Jenny. "Goodbye, Mrs Brady. A pleasure to meet you." He shook hands with the others who were rather surprised. They had not expected the detective to leave them so soon.
None asked him where he was going. They were not surprised, however, when he turned his horse about and began to ride into the shadows of the canyon, on his way to the Realm Below.
They watched until he disappeared. "A man after my own heart, that Englishman," said young Tex. "I almost wish I was going with him."
"Where he goes, he goes alone, I think," said Don Lorenzo, frowning. He murmured some sort of prayer under his breath and crossed himself.
"Well, I seem to be the only one looking forward to getting home," said Jenny with a grin. "After this strange experience I'll never be bored with the ordinary routines of the Circle Squared."
By now they had ridden up to where the tram-tracks began. Captain Gideon stepped forward, saluting. 
The Masked Buckaroo thanked him for responding so rapidly and efficiently to his messages.
"I'm glad we could be of help," Gideon insisted warmly.
"You will never appreciate the full extent of your help, captain," said young Tex dismounting. 

AS THEY CLIMBED the steps of the heavy war-tram and took their places on the mahogany seats, the young buckaroo put a strong and manly arm about his wife's shoulders. Soon the vehicle was in motion, racing back across the plains as a second machine collected track behind it, a demonstration of the skill and ingenuity of 'Thunderclap' Meadley's famous 'Flying Tracklayers', who had done so much for Texas's military reputation. Within hours they would be back at the Circle Squared.
Yet for all Jenny's talk of a return to normality, the young avenger knew that life would never be quite the same again.
No matter how much he blocked it from his conscious mind, he would continue to dream of that subterranean world Sir Seaton called The Grey Fees. He would long to experience its alien wonders. Then one day he knew his curiosity would get the better of him. He would give in to his impulse, saddle his horse, and retrace the trail to the Realm Below.
Something in him yearned for that day to come, but he was not to know how soon his desire would be fulfilled!
For that is another story.
 
THE END
of an sf detective western lost race sword
and sorcery fantasy story by W. Colvin Jnr
 
COMING SOON!

Another great new 'Masked Buckaroo' adventure
from the lost files of Warwick Colvin! 
Don't Miss—
THE MASKED BUCKAROO
in the
DEVIL'S CAVERN!!

"The Ghost Warriors" was first published in Tales from the Texas Woods by Michael Moorcock (Mojo Press, 1997.)