Casca 52- the Rough Rider Read online

  CASCA

  THE ROUGH RIDER

  This is a book of fiction. All the names, characters and events portrayed in this book are

  Fictional and any resemblance to real people and incidents are purely coincidental.

  CASCA: THE ROUGH RIDER

  Published by arrangement with Eastaboga Entertainment, Inc.

  Printing History

  2020

  Printed in the United Kingdom

  Copyright 2020 Eastaboga Entertainment, Inc.

  Cover Design by John Thompson

  All Rights Reserved

  Including the rights to reproduce this book or portions thereof

  In any form or format without permission.

  ISBN 978-1513660066

  Printed in the United Kingdom

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  This is my 26th Casca novel and was a suggestion by a good Casca colleague and the man who does the wonderful artwork on the covers, John Thompson. Therefore this book is dedicated to him, not only for his suggestion, but for all his support, assistance and excellent artwork he has done these past few years.

  You can buy all of my Casca novels on the official website www.casca.net

  I also write three other series of books, a high fantasy series ‘Kastania’, another fantasy series ‘Dark Blade’ and a fictional rock band biopic called ‘Siren’. Details of all these books can be found on my author website www.tonyrobertsauthor.com

  I live in Bristol, with my partner Jane and a fluffy cat called Cassia.

  Table of Contents

  CASCA

  THE ROUGH RIDER

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  PROLOGUE

  New Mexico, South West United States, April 1898

  The campfire flickered under the stars, illuminating the face of the lone man sitting beside it. He was still, peering into the flames, seemingly lost in his own little world. He wore apparel that would probably be called a cowboy’s, brown checked shirt, open at the throat, off-blue trousers, short stout leather boots with a heel, and a pair of bracers forming a ‘Y’ up the back.

  His felt hat, that had a wide grey brim, lay to one side on the ground. Every so often his eyes, light blue in color, flicked up to look out into the night, then slowly returned to the flames. The orange glow cast on his face showed a scar running down the right-hand side from just below his eye to the mouth.

  Those light blue eyes had seen so much down the years, so much more than anyone would believe. In fact they would not believe it, because he had seen events and empires rise and fall for the last nineteen centuries. Immortality had been bestowed on him on a hill outside Jerusalem in the thirty-first year of his mortal life, and ever since then he had learned that a life without ageing or dying was not a blessing, but a curse. A damned existence.

  He had been Casca Rufio Longinus then, a soldier of the Tenth Legion of the Roman Empire, and drawing execution duty on Golgotha to execute the condemned trio, including the one called Yeshua – Jesus – had put him on a collision course with destiny.

  In trying to end Jesus’ suffering hanging on the cross he had only wounded the condemned man, and he had been cursed for his action. He had on many occasions since considered it a harsh reaction for what had been an act of kindness. So now he could not die, could not age, could not have issue. He had never been able to call any place a home, or stay for long, because sooner or later someone would realize something wasn’t right, and the trouble would begin.

  It made him terribly lonely, and sometimes he wanted just to hide away from everyone, everything. There had been times when he’d managed to do that, either by accident or design, and decades had passed while he had either been entombed in ice, trapped underground, buried under a sand dune or lying underwater somewhere in suspended animation. He’d been stabbed, shot, burned, hanged, thrown off cliffs and all other kinds of grisly fates that would have seen off any other person, but he could not die. Yes, it would appear to all around that he was, but his body would slowly repair itself, and the pain of his ‘rebirth’ would remind him he was immortal.

  At least until the Second Coming, or so that’s what Jesus had said before expiring on that damned cross.

  There were others who believed that, too. The Brotherhood of the Lamb for one. His mortal enemies, that fanatical bunch of maniacs who were made up of the most extreme religious zealots, dedicated to hunting him and punishing him for what he’d done to Jesus that day. Like him, they were immortal, but only because there were so many of them and every generation they recruited more from the ranks of the desperate, gullible, vulnerable and crazy. No matter how many of them died, more were there to take their place in the ranks of the unlovely. They saw him, Casca, as the route to Jesus. So they wanted to keep him their prisoner for the rest of eternity. A chilling thought, and there had been times when he had been theirs, but always he had managed to get away from their clutches.

  And he had allies.

  His adopted family, the Longini. A small, dedicated group of anti-Brotherhood people. Again, anonymous, hidden, secretive. But they were there to protect him against those madmen. Maybe he was under surveillance now. Maybe again he wasn’t.

  He spat into the fire and it sizzled. Screw it. He would just carry on doing his own thing and let the Brotherhood and Longini battle behind the scenes. His eyes scanned the darkness again, and his ears strained to hear anything out there, any noise that might betray something or someone closing in on him. Nothing.

  He had to change his name frequently to cover his tracks. God alone knows how many times he had to do that. He couldn’t use his Roman name anymore, for two good reasons. One, Roman names weren’t exactly popular these days and tended to stand out. And secondly, using Casca Longinus would alert the Brotherhood immediately. No, he had to use a corruption of his old name. He’d used many, and already this century he’d done that. He’d begun the 1800s where? He pulled a thoughtful face. France. The revolutionary France under Napoleon. Yeah, he’d been Casca Longue then, pretty close to his true name that, and a little risky, but in revolutionary Europe with war gripping it almost constantly, it was easier to remain hidden in plain sight.

  He’d left the French eagles after the debacle in Russia and deserted after being shot by firing squad. He’d found his way to the Low Countries and enlisted into Wellington’s anti-French coalition for the big fight at Waterloo, disguised as an Englishman, Cass Long. Once Napoleon had been defeated, he’d left Northern Europe and gone to Greece as a mercenary to fight for the Greeks in their war of independence, then onwards to Africa as a member of the French Foreign Legion. He’d been German then, Rufus Lang. That had been bloody and pitiless, and once he’d got on the wrong side of the Legion thanks to a woman, he’d deserted, trekked south through Africa and ended up in the south, joining the Boers on their voor trek, out into new lands and fighting Zulus. His name had been Klaas van der Lang then.

  Then hunted by the British he’d fled to the States and changed name once more to Case Lonnergan. That had been a time of wars, too. First in Mexico, then the civil war when he’d fought for the South – not for slavery, but for the rights of the individual states to determine their own rights. So in crushing slavery and freeing the millions of slaves, the North had crushed the rights of self-determination of the i
ndividual states. And they’d done precious little to help the freed slaves find jobs, homes, lives. They’d just left them to fend for themselves.

  Disillusioned with the brave new world run by carpet-baggers, he’d drifted west and found employment in the lawless frontier lands, until he’d gone out into the Pacific seeking new gods and lands and got involved in cannibalism and being buried alive. He’d got out of that and sailed away and got washed up on the Pacific coast of the States once more, and got enlisted in the 7th Cavalry under Custer, fighting at the Little Bighorn in 1876. He was known as Casey Long then. After the battle he’d left the army, the lone survivor, and come west once more. The Indian Wars were mostly gone, except for one or two small outbreaks, but there was still plenty for someone like him to get involved with.

  Outlaws, renegades, crooks. All had to be dealt with and people like him, still calling himself Casey Long, could make themselves useful to those who could pay. So here he was, a fortune hunter, a dealer of problems. Criminals and outlaws were fair game to him, provided he was paid and given a clear job to do. And provided, of course, it was legal. The lawmen had their hands full here in the west so people like him were tolerated. The irony was, if he and others like him did their job really well, they’d eliminate the reason they were wanted and would make themselves redundant.

  Ah well, there were other jobs to find elsewhere, he reasoned.

  He looked up once more. Yep. Someone was coming his way. He gathered himself and placed his hat on his head. His pistol was in his holster, a Colt .45. His horse, tethered against some termite-riddled tree stump behind him, had the rest of his equipment including a Remington rolling block rifle.

  Standing up, he moved to one side of the fire and watched as a couple of figures materialized out of the dark. Both were men with wide-brimmed felt hats, like his. They stopped, still on horseback, and peered down at the lone man by the fire. “So, you got the money?” one asked aggressively.

  “Yeah,” Casey replied, waving vaguely behind him where his horse stood, quietly eating on some tough grass.

  “So get it, then.”

  Casey looked at both men. One had his rifle across his lap, not pointing at Casey but it wouldn’t take much for him to aim and fire. He was sat quietly, watching the scarred man with suspicion. Casey turned and loped over to his horse and lifted off the saddle a small leather satchel with a long flap over one side. It had a long strap which dangled down as the eternal mercenary brought it back to the fireside. He stood, looking at it for a long moment.

  “Hand the goddam money over!” the leader of the two snapped impatiently, “or we drill a few holes in you and then take it.”

  “Promise you won’t burn down the ranch? Mister George has put all his life savings into this ransom, you know.”

  “Look, mister,” the talker said, “we want the money. George pays up and we leave him alone. Simple. He and his cute little virgin daughter can stay in their home intact.” He grinned in a way that didn’t give Casey any confidence.

  Casey nodded briefly, thinking that the cute little daughter was no virgin. He’d found that out two nights ago, when she’d bedded him in gratitude for his part in the plan to thwart the Cacero Gang’s protection racket. Not that he minded, and he’d not asked her to, but she had been ever so grateful, and he wasn’t going to argue.

  He passed the satchel to the talker who took it, then snorted in amusement. He lifted the flap and peered in, then put a hand in to pull out the expected wad of notes. There came a snap of something and he screamed in pain and surprise.

  Casey didn’t even look to see the man pull his hand out, the mousetrap clamped tightly on his fingers. He was pulling out his Colt and cocking the hammer in one smooth movement, centering his muzzle on the rifleman’s chest. The rifleman had been distracted by the mousetrap and the shout of pain from his boss, so he hadn’t even begun to swing the rifle towards Casey when the soft-nosed .45 slug took him through the chest and sent him off the saddle in a shower of blood and gore. The pistol wasn’t accurate over ten yards but this was ludicrously close-up.

  The other tore off the trap, his fingers throbbing with agony and fumbled for his pistol, but he was always going to be too late. Even as the weapon came free of its holster, Casey’s second shot smashed through his ribs, pitching him off his horse, and he crashed to the ground in a heap.

  The smell of discharged gunpowder was strong in the air as Casey walked up to the two men, checking that they were dead. They were. Their horses had bolted off in fright. He picked up the satchel and upended it, pouring out pieces of paper with the word ‘sucker’ written on them. No ransom money. Nope. Casey had been paid by George to take care of this little gang. While not the Silva Gang of recent years, this lot had been making themselves a nuisance and the locals had collaborated under George to do something about it.

  Casey had been between jobs so he had volunteered to take care of them, for a fee. One of the other ranchers had greased the local sheriff’s palm to look the other way, and Casey had been given free reign to take out the duo.

  It took Casey an hour to find the two horses, then tie the two bodies to their mounts and lead them back to Santa Fe, leaving them outside the local law enforcement office before riding away.

  His next port of call would be at Mr. George’s ranch, and he hoped his daughter, the cute Lynda, a nineteen-year-old bundle of energy, would reward him once more. He grinned to himself in the night as he rode on. Sometimes this job paid out much better than at other times.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Santa Fe was growing fast. Lots of new wood buildings had gone up in the last couple of years, and it looked like a desert with buildings put up in the middle of nowhere. The land had been cleared all around to make space for the bourgeoning township, and more people were coming to live here. Gold had been discovered nearby and that always brought people from afar, and those who weren’t actually miners and those who didn’t wish to live in the harsh mining communities set up home nearby in the more civilized setting.

  Here one could find all the trappings of civilization; saloons, brothels, law enforcement offices and banks. All closely interlinked. Casey smiled and leaned against one of the wooden pillars holding up the overhanging roof of the barber’s shop. He’d just had a haircut and felt a new man, clean shaven, cropped hair and fresh-faced. He worked his facial muscles. Having cheeks and a jaw as smooth as a baby’s fanny wasn’t a feeling he usually had, but hell, with the proceeds of getting rid of those two low-lives, why shouldn’t he live a little?

  A drink, a hot, hearty meal, a shave and a haircut. Now that was civilization. To top it all, the Saturday April 23 edition of the Santa Fe, New Mexican newspaper was in his hands as he leaned in comfort on the side of the road. His eyes were instantly drawn to one of the headlines at the top of the front page. Want Volunteers, it declared. A war was coming. He peered intently at the article in the column directly below the header. President William McKinley was asking for 125,000 volunteers to serve up to two years for the coming war with Spain.

  War with Spain? Casey looked thoughtfully into the clear blue sky above Santa Fe. The United States hadn’t been at war since the Mexican conflict he’d been part of in the 1840s, and after the civil war there had been the Indian Wars but nothing like this. The States had a small army, placed in widely-scattered garrisons all over the West, mostly. So to fight an established European nation they would have to call up plenty of new soldiers.

  Spain had the remnants of its old empire scattered around the world; the Philippines, a few islands in the Pacific, and Cuba. Cuba. He thought back to the one and only previous time he’d been there, back in 1519, when Hernan Cortez had assembled an army of conquistadores to land in what was now modern-day Mexico and embark on a campaign that would ultimately bring down the mighty Aztec Empire. Those were the days…

  So, Cuba. The USS Maine had sunk in Havana harbor taking over 240 souls with her, and the Americans, outraged at the incident, had decided
war was necessary. Casey smiled sardonically. The Spanish had been fighting a war against Cuban separatists for a number of years, with the American press heavily backing the insurgents, so it was no surprise that when the Maine had gone down, foul play was suspected at once. Could be the Spanish had sunk it, yes. Could be some other reason. But anyway, the Americans had their casus belli and were now mobilizing.

  Casey smiled at the Roman phrase he’d put into his mind. His mother tongue was never far from him. He may no longer be a citizen of the Roman Empire, for it had gone, but he was always to his mind a Roman. So, volunteers wanted for a war, eh? He folded the newspaper and placed it on the window sill of the barber’s.

  Seemed like he had a job coming, after all. He’d been away from war for twenty years or so, and his body itched for it. He knew he shouldn’t, but he couldn’t resist it. He guessed it was probably the Curse, calling him, making him want to. Damn it to hell. He pulled a wry expression as he stepped onto the packed earth road and crossed the road to the newspaper printer’s.

  “Hey, Al,” he greeted the sweating man behind the counter, round-lensed glasses, shirt sleeves and balding head. “What’s the news on the volunteers?”

  “Oh, hi, Casey. The President wants 125,000 volunteers to go fight the Spanish. Each state and territory to provide a quota. Seems New Mexico is setting up a few recruitment centers, including one here. Think they’re organizing it now at the old Fort Marcy on the edge of town, you know, just up from the church. I heard they’re gonna call it Camp Otero.”

  “What, after the governor?”

  “Yup. You interested in joining up?”

  “Could be. Need the money and jobs are getting harder to find for someone like me.”

  “You want to be shot at by some angry Spaniard?”

  “Been shot at by angry outlaws a-plenty already. Might as well get paid for it and know I’ve got the law on my side.”