Chapter One - Dime Novels & Tall Tales

                                                                                                                

 

‘The gunfighter, Ned Tolliver, U.S. Marshall from Ft. Smith, Arkansas stood alone in the dusty Abilene street facing three armed Wyoming desperadoes who could at any moment launch a hail of lead leaving Ned dead face down ass up when the gunsmoke finally cleared. The townspeople had shuttered the storefronts, took cover under tables and left the streets deserted.  Only the cowhands fresh off the Chisholm trail in the Half Moon Saloon were ignoring safety fortified thanks to shots of rotgut whiskey and the promise of  a silver dollar romp in an upstairs room with one of Miss Sally’s fresh batch of soiled doves recently arrived from Kansas City.

 

The player piano cranked out a Camptown Do Dah Do Dah just as silver six guns began blazing away under the heat of a cowtown high noon. Ned Tolliver, tall and proud and handsome stood his ground, steely eyed, calm, focused. By the time the deadly haze created by the Navy Colts settled...three Wyoming desperadoes were ready to be taken to Boot Hill. Ned Tolliver walked tall in the saddle to the Half Moon where the cowboys bought him drinks and Miss Sally offered him the pick of the harem...on the house.  

 

Ned Tolliver...U.S. Marshall and King of the Gunfighters. Men feared him, he feared no man!!!’

(From the dime novel “Ned Tolliver: The Avenger of Abilene” By Baxter Dooley)

 

Written  by my grandfather, Baxter Dooley, who had written a whole collection of Ned Tolliver dime novels along with as much wild west pulp as he could  over the years for a reason. Baxter Dooley, retired U.S. Marshall and was sometimes a hired gun for the right money.  

 

He wrote the Ned Tolliver novels and kids in the 1800’s had grown up with.  Stories of his  own adventures in the old west. He was one of the body guards from the Metropolitan Police Department of Washington, D.C. assigned to protect President Abraham Lincoln the night he was assassinated at Ford’s Theater. They failed and that failure took it’s toll on him.

 

He  ended up leaving the force soon after, traveled west and signed on as a U.S. Marshall head quarted at Ft. Smith, Arkansas, was determined to make up for the D.C. disaster. He began writing dime novels based on his own adventures under the big sky and Indian territory.

 

Baxter started writing dime novels when The  American west was ablaze with tall tales of cowboys and indians, showdowns and shootouts, barroom brawls, and Custer’s Last Stand. It was an era of rifles and six guns blasting away in a hail of blazing gunfire between outlandish outlaw gangs and hot pursuit posse's. Outlaws and law dogs were colorful characters and their exploits filled the pages of dime novels and newspapers that in turn were devoured by a hungry populace along the the eastern seaboard and major cities of the young country that was fast becoming civilized and settled.

The Revolver... a Sam Colt weapon of High Noon destruction was the gun of choice for machismo and survival in a land of high plains drifters and grifters, hot headed gamblers, and deadheaded drunks who would rather kill or be killed than to suffer an insult. "Sticks and stones will break my bones, but names will never hurt me" was not the way of the cowboy! Call a callous cowboy chickenshit and watch the hot lead fly.


It seems like every third cowboy in the west was named "Texas" something or other or "Montana" - no one to my knowledge was ever named the Pennsylvania Kid or Doc.

 

My name is Seth Dooley. Baxter’s great grandson. Cowboys and their adventures for obvious reasons have always fascinated me. It’s now the era of television. Television generates a plethora of small screen low grade high noon meet you on Main Street shoot outs, along with a placenta packed sack of singing cowboys with white hats galloping across the cathode ray tube high chaparral firing hot lead while in hot pursuit of bad guys wearing black hats.

 

The Godzilla of the TV western genre was "Gunsmoke" the show that kept the cowtown of Dodge City clean for over 20 television dog years with a cast of characters from Miss Kitty, she a madam of a second floor bordello of a saloon serving up watered down whiskey along with venereal disease from the soiled doves in the upstairs loft. I always wondered if Marshall Dillon ever dropped his gun belt once to have a go at Miss Kitty or was he just firing blanks?

Singing cowboys never shot the bad guy to kill..only wound and somehow blood never spilled. Plus the singing cowboy always serenaded the girl..but never took her to bed! I dunno, you spend all that time plunking a guitar and singing your plaintive heart out you should get something in return..something wild and wooly from south of her border when you drop your holster and load your chamber with live ammo!


I also never could grasp the sex on these shows nor in the old west itself...riding on a cattle drive for weeks...no bath, stinking like a sidewinder dead for three days..no change of underwear then they waltz into town Matilda and have beautiful bar girls sitting on their lap...let alone going to the upstairs rooms later now masking the scent of the cows and dung with the overpowering staggering smell of whiskey and cigars. Of course the doves were probably no better off in the hygiene department so was probably like two pigs wallowing in a mud hole…

Good Bad and Ugly...but I still have a special fondness for the romance of the tv western...ah..the romantic west..thank god for Opium dens and Asian prostitutes...now we're talking my kind of wild, wild west...fill that pipe, fire it up and away we go...bang bang my little Lotus Blossom!!!

 

So I began researching archives for the real story of  Baxter Dooley.  Relying on his personal collection of letters that were donated to the University of the Mexico at one time; excerpts from some of his more popular dime novel adventure stories, and most especially from reams of papers dictated by him in the first person  when he was interviewed by a British journalist just before he died in 1939.  

 

What I found out was something more incredible than found in any dime novel, proving Cowboy Machismo was a real six gun deal and the fact that real gunslingers don’t sing or dance...but the do get the girl!  

Chapter Two - Lincoln & Robert E Lee Harvey Oswald

 

 

Researching the Library of Congress archives I ran across personal statements and testimony from the Metropolitan Police of Washington D.C. (including my great grandfather, Baxter Dooley) assigned to protect President Abraham Lincoln the night he was gunned down and eventually became a penny, a Hot Rod Lincoln rom Detroit, a city in Nebraska, a face imbedded on Mt. Rushmore, and a tunnel in New York. Conflicting testimony tied the investigation up for years as though it was a ball of tangled fishing line in a tackle, box but some facts are irrefutable and in agreement.

 

Lincoln was not shot at Ford’s Theater by a lone gunman named John Wilkes Booth. Pure fiction if truth be told, and photographs don’t lie. One picture is worth 1,000 words of Congressional Testimony.

 

Eyewitness accounts seem to back up the theory that while riding along with the First Lady on Pennsylvania Ave. in a surrey with the fringe on top a bullet ripped through the back of his head from a bullet fired from the second floor book depository of the Library of Congress. The weapon was determined to be an Italian Carcano bolt action rifle developed in 1860 utilizing brass cartridges once the alleged assassin was taken into custody after he fled the building and apprehended later that day in a peep show watching Libyan belly dancers gyrate their Tripoli’s to military marching music.

 

The man in custody turned out to be Robert E. Lee Harvey Oswald, an activist for a group known as Fair Play for Canada. He also had traveled to Czarist Russia seeking a life and wife, and ended up marrying a Ukraine dame, Anastasia Bulgaria Albania Romanoff and together began a life as counterfeiters producing knock offs of Faberge Eggs  to sell to tourists heading to Siberia.

 

While there he came under the influence of a group of comedians known as the Karl Marx Brothers from Karamozov and began doing PR work for their shows. “We wowed them in St. Petersburg!” he once wrote.

 

Later he left for America with his Russian bride settled into Richmond, Virginia. When the war broke out he fought with Bloody Bill Anderson in Missouri. When the war ended he said, “It never ended for me. The South surrendered...not me.” His hatred grew and culminated that fateful day on Pennsylvania Ave.

 

As he was being transferred from police headquarters in D.C. a gunman was waiting in the crowd who fired point blank and killed the accused assassin. The killer this time, a Union loyalist, Ulysses S. Ruby was the owner of a strip club called the Appomattox Pussy Cat Theater featuring dancers from the Underground Railroad Review originally from Sierra Leone.

 

The entire event was captured on film made from glass plates by a young amateur photographer, Matthew Brady Zapruder  who was in an ideal location at the time. Other witnesses claim there was a second shooter as gunfire was heard from Vice President Andrew Johnson’s home known as the Grassy Knoll.

 

The truth may never be known...conspiracy theories abound. Where was  Jefferson Davis at the time? Where was Lincoln’s mistress, Maryland Monroe? Lincoln’s best friend from Indonesia, Frank Sumatra? The only thing I know for sure is that my great grandfather was demoralized and left D. C. after failing to protect the life of Lincoln while Robert E. Lee Harvey Oswalds great grandson was accused of assassinating JFK in Dallas almost 100 years later. JFK was killed while riding not in a surrey but in a limo...a Lincoln by the way.

Chapter Three - Mexican Gold & The Voodoo Queen

 

 

( A Pinkerton Dime Novel Detective Serial Segment by Baxter Dooley

Soon after the Lincoln assassination I left my job with the  Washington Metropolitan Police force.  I had been invited by my good friend, the ego driven Allan Pinkerton of the famed detective agency to join him as an independent operative along with a determined gun toting posse of Canada’s Royal Canadian Mounted Police known in these parts as  Scotland Yard on horseback. Our mission was to track down the nefarious and notorious French Canadian gun totin’ killer and train robbing varmint, Monty Debauchery. He had already robbed ten  trains from Montreal to British Columbia relieving the passengers of jewelry and cash along with three payrolls of the Yukon Mining Company;   he has killed one railroad policeman in Montreal and some say 12 men because he didn’t like the way they looked or he just felt like blowing off steam by filling someone with a load of .45 caliber Colt ammo.

 

He has been eluding the Mounties who always get their man, except in this case, having crossed the border into New York and is now on the run in the United States and an international posse was hot on his trail to bring him to the gallows to swing in the breeze.

 

We learned from one of the jailed James Gang members that Pinkerton knew, that Monty had made his way by train to Missouri and booked passage on a riverboat in St. Louis  for a gangland reunion in New Orleans with other escaped outlaws of the Montreal gang  who had already fled the long arm of the Canuck law. We surmised they were up to no good and would institute a reign of terror on American soil in Cajun country where a deafening cacophony of patois and pistoleros already existed.

 

We booked passage as a group in what can only be called a close call in the nick of time on the same Tom Sawyerish riverboat, ‘The Natchez River Queen’  posing as gaming sports  intent on gambling our poker nights away to the very mouth of the mighty Mississippi in the roiling wake of Mark Twain’s literary Mickey Finn riverboat pirates.

 

The Wild West. A time of Conestoga wagon trains of adventurous seekers of land and a new life creaking across the high plains racing the iron horse across Indian and buffalo lands once the preserve of Cheyenne, Pawnee, and Utes.

 

While wagon trains and the railroads absorbed the land, river boats were churning up the Mississippi in a paddlewheel frenzy rolling down the river avoiding shallow shoals as the experienced pilots avoid the danger of floating logs from Illinois   The Manifest Destiny of James Monroe sent the country on a binge of westward expansion and soon small towns cropped up. Snake oil salesmen set up traveling snake oil medicine shows with dancers, singers, sharpshooters and jugglers to help soften the masses before fleecing them of their hard earned greenbacks.

 

The riverboats too were havens for gambling and drinking along with singing and dancing, some of it risque where women with full skirts would lift it up so the men would whoop it up with the first sign of female flesh in the form of thigh and a hint of what lay just below the navel. They were called "leg shows" and every cowpoke fresh off the trail would mix with the Eastern dandies in rooms choking with tobacco smoke, the smell of horse permeated chaps, and the unwashed cowboys trying to mask the musk with violet scented water.

 

In this era and it’s riverboat atmosphere of deplorable decadence we kept an eagle  eye on Monty’s shipboard movements. One night while he was on deck alone watching the moonlight sparkle  on the muddy night river waters like the flash of pistols  firing bullets in an ambush outside a whorehouse in Dodge City, I was alone on deck at the time and realized we were a half hour to docking  in New Orleans. The game would soon be up as I  knew  he would be on shore disappearing into the cover of a New Orleans dawn. I then decided to act drawing my Colt.

 

“Don’t even go for your gun, Monty. Yes, I know who you are.”

 

“Copper, eh? OK, you got me, now what?”

 

“I’m arresting you and you have some RCMP friends here who want to take you back to Montreal to stand trial.”

 

He turned around slowly as I kept a watchful eye on him as sure as one would watch a rattlesnake coiled and ready to strike  “I have a deal for you,” he said with a French inflection. “How would you like to find a lost city of gold in Old Mexico? As partners of course.”

 

He reached slowly into his waistcoat pocket and produced a torn tattered piece of linen with what appeared to be a map of some sort, in Spanish. “Not interested,” I replied. “Out of curiosity though, and purely out of curiosity what is that?”

 

“This my friend is a map to riches in Mexico. Not the fabled lost cities of Cibola Coronado and others have  spent centuries trying to locate. This is a city with buried Spanish  treasure. Enough to buy a small country.”

 

I noticed he only had half a map. “Oh that, the other half is here in New Orleans. A young Creole girl has it. Her father was given it by a dying Confederate soldier who came across it in Texas looting a home owned by a Mexican padrone. We were going to be partners. He gave me half when we were in Montreal and he kept the other. We were to meet in New Orleans where  we would raise financing for  our expedition. Unfortunately he died suddenly, some bayou typhoid or malaria or some damn swamp thing.  His daughter, Isadora, who I hear tell is  voodoo priestess or something to do with spells, curses and the undead refused to give the other half up after repeated letters and telegrams. So I am here now to get it back..by reasoning or other means.”

 

“Why should I help you? Why don’t  I take your half of the map and find her and team up if she’s willing, and leave you out in the cold?”

 

Monty laughed. “Because you’re an honest lawman  and you’ve got me over a barrel, and I need someone and you do too who’s good with a gun if we’re to this.  Mexico and gringos don’t go together very well. Bandits will kill you for a pair of leather boots, and the Federales require bribes of US currency to keep from murdering you in the name of the law. We go as prospectors. They laugh at all gringos searching for stakes of gold so we won’t be taken seriously. What we really want is the gold of the Spanish conquistadors.”

 

Now I was interested. Monty continued. “After they had wounded the Aztec emperor, Montezuma, whom they had taken prisoner, Cortez and his Spanish soldiers were besieged in Tenochtitlan or what we now call Mexico City by Aztec soldiers led by an Aztec priest. After days of  fighting, the Spaniards attempted to retreat from the city during the night  with the whole treasure of Montezuma. When day dawned over Lake Tezcuco, surrounding Tenochtitlan, was filled with the bodies of dead Spainards and on its bottom rested the great treasure of Montezuma that was thrown into the lake. gold and silver ornaments, and an immense quantity of jewels. The ornaments had been reduced to gold bars by the Spaniards, and were also cast into the lake.

 

According to legends, when Cortez took siege of Mexico City in 1521, the Aztec Indians secreted their treasure hoards in and around the Lake of the city and, in particular, in a cave in the nearby hillsides surrounding the city. A rich treasure is said to be hidden in the vaults under the church of San Geronimo por la Santissima Virgen in Mexico City.”

I was mesmerized by visions of massive treasure. Enough to start my own ranch in Texas which had always been my dream. I was in a dream state but not for long. One of Monty’s henchmen came up from behind and let me have the barrel of his Colt on the back of my head knocking me out cold. I found out later they had rowed out in a boat to rescue Monty who now had escaped in the small boat heading for New Orleans in the dawn’s early light.

 

When Pinkerton came on deck he found me out cold. I Ttold him he was about to escape when  I stopped him but someone from behind had gotten the better of me. I failed to mention the map, the gold and treasure in Mexico and the girl with the other half of the map.

Once we docked Pinkerton and his Mountie friends would search for Monty scouring the city. I would part company, claiming other urgent business and search for this Isadora. Maybe she would agree to team up with me….or perhaps put a spell on me and turn me into one

Chapter 4 - Opium Days and Bordello Nights

 

(Baxter Dooley & Isadora Lavolier)

Personal Journal Entry July 27, 1867 I parted company with Pinkerton and set about finding Isadora Lavolier who was in possession of one half of the map leading to hidden  treasure in Mexico. Half a map is useless, yet better than no map at all,  but I knew Monty Debauchery would do anything, including murder to obtain the other half that was in the care of Isadora. Find Isadora, and I’ll find Monty and the other half of the linen puzzle. I also had to convince her I wasn’t a misanthrope out for mere adventure, although the hint of engaging in a dangerous enterprise got my blood rushing in torrents of anticipation.  

 

I started my search in New Orleans Chinatown. My current mindset was a visionary jumble of Mexican pinatas, silver jewelry, ancient Toltec  kings forcing young  virgins to be sanctified through sacrificial rituals of heart extraction known only to High Priests wearing plumes and loincloths as incense burned slowly around the stone altars  of the great pyramid of Tenochtitlan. The Aztec gods were thirsty it seems.

 

The search for Isadora would require inquiries and time, so decided to get settled into a room in the Latin Quarter and immerse myself in the opium dens of Chinatown. If I’m going to have visions let them be ones that would transport me to the time of the Tang Dynasty. After a few pipes of smoke I’d be floating on a Chinese paper boat  along a mystical river in space and time past the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms of this ancient Oriental land guided by seven veiled female attendants.

 

I entered one called the Celestial  Moon. There were upper class men and women, Orientals and Occidentals together imbibing in the long stems reclining in repose waiting for the oil lamps to heat the drug until it was vaporous. Inhaling the heavenly spirit of the ancient dragon Meng Zhang as they lay prone on the floor as their minds soared to the pinnacle of Minya Konka, sacred to the monks of Tibet.

 

A few hours of blissful peace, I was ready to begin my search for the mysterious Isadora and her magic spells and out of focus hocus pocus sense of spirituality. I was decidedly refreshed after my journey to the other world, but now it was time to immerse myself in the tawdry lewdness of The French Quarter. If voodoo was a reality in this land of Creoles and superstition, I might get the information I needed on locating Isadora and one half of the map to find treasure and hopefully my future.

 

In New Orleans you go the Quarter for three things. To drink, gamble and have sex with a Cajun of questionable morals in one the city’s Red Light District brothels on Basin Street. A wonderland for  prostitution, gambling and entertainment including music in the bordellos.  If you are a visitor not a local, they have  guidebooks of prostitution for visitors  including  house descriptions, prices, services, and the "stock" each house offered.

I chose Madam Hattie’s “21” House where I obtained the services of a young lady, part Seminole, part French for a romp after a half-bottle of questionable whiskey. When we finished our business I sat down and spoke to Madam Hattie to see if she could guide me to the voodoo vortex of this magnificent city of Red Light delights. I mentioned Isadora as Madam Hattie seemed the type who would know every dirty secret and every person on the fringe of society in this boisterous city of carnal pleasures and magic. She did.

She told me if I was looking for a young  woman who speaks to the spirit world and dances with the undead and gave me an address on St. Anne Street. She also corrected me….Isadora was not a Creole. She was a Quadroon which is a person of African, Indian and Caucasian blood, the Caucasian in this case was French.  I can’t keep it all straight...one man’s Creole is another man’s Cajun...now I was now faced with the  linguistic quandary the Quadroon.

Chapter 5 - Three Days of Petit Angel

 

The Three Days of Le Petit Angel

Personal Journal Entry - July 28, 1867

Baxter Dooley

 

I decided not to wait until the morning sun explodes on the horizon to make my way into a heretofore unexplored region of the unholy undead.

 

Voodoo! The word has all the charm of a venereal disease and gave me  chills deep inside, probably the same feeling when the hanging judge, Judge Parker pronounces the old death by hanging sentence to a homicidal desperado who for some unknown reason took the lives of a local ranch family recently near Buffalo, Wyoming  for no other purpose than to get his  hands on a few greenbacks tucked away in a jar in the kitchen and a platter of fresh apple pie made for the county fair competition the next day. There would be no ribbons awarded this time for first prize to Maddie Hanson whose pie it was that was eaten by a man who was judge, jury and executioner of the entire Hanson family who lived five dusty dirt road wagon rut miles out of town.

 

Voodoo! I was looking for the address that would unlock the door to riches, the kind of wealth Conquistidors and grizzled old prospectors dream about as they search relentlessly for elusive dreams that never come true. The Seven Cities of Gold, Cibola illusions, elusive and never found

 

I came upon the home of Isadora and before I could knock on the door it opened slowly and Isadora stood there and bid me enter, not only to her home, but as I would find out, to another realm a new dimension most of us  unfamiliar with.  

 

“I am Isadora, may I help you?”

 

I was frightened. How in hell did she know I was coming? There must be something to this voodoo and the spirit world. I guess the look of wild eyed fright gave my thoughts away.

 

“Aha. I can see from your face what you must be thinking. No, I didn’t know you were coming until 10 minutes ago. Madam Hattie sent a young boy ahead to tell me you were coming. Nothing mysterious. Just our way down here. We look out for each other. Please come in.”

 

She was a bronze Venus de Milo, except she had arms. Legs? They were stairways to the clouds.  Her eyes a violet color that bore through your very soul.   Her face was a bronze Quadroon beauty you find only in works of art in the finest galleries of Europe. Her  voice was deep, raspy, and sexy as she spoke with a Louisiana Creole French patois I was beginning to enjoy having been  immersed in it ever since I set foot on the wooden docks in the New Orleans harbor.

 

She offered me wine, rich, red and thick, imported from France where wine making is an art. I accepted gratefully with a smile. “I’m here to make you a proposition. One that I hope you will embrace, but all I’ve heard all day is about voodoo, spirits and black and white magic. Is this on the level or merely parlor tricks?”

 

She threw her head back,  laughter bursting  forth with the impact of a stampede of longhorns. “If you mean zombies and spells, let me tell you. Then you decide. In voodoo we have the great spirit. Just as you whites have your Jesus and God, we have Li Grand Zombi He is our great spirit and is a snake. He is responsible for zombies.  You must understand. We believe the living body is home to two angels. One Petit and one known as the Grand Angel. When you die your Grand Angel goes immediately to heaven. The Petit angel waits for three days to leave. Much like your Jesus rose from the dead after three days. Should your Petit angel not leave, you might turn into a zombie. My duty is to help the Petit angel to escape before that happens. There is one spirit, Ghede who is the one who wants to rule over zombies, he is like your Christian Satan, or devil, but Ghede is an alcoholic and for a bottle of whiskey or rum he will give up the Petit angel to heaven. That and a few spells cast in his direction.”

 

This was hard to absorb all at once. “A zombie is a snake?”

“In symbolic form yes as a spirit, but human when it walks the earth. What is so hard to understand? Did not your God create a serpent in the Garden of Eden to lead Adam and Eve into this physical world we all dwell in? You must remember, voodoo was born of Catholicism and in the Caribbean as here, it is natural for us who practice voodoo to know our French Catholic roots along with our African beliefs. We are blended.”

 

I had no argument. She was making more sense than I cared to admit.

 

“This is a lot to take in. May I have another drink please?” I asked visibly shaken.

 

“Of course you may. You re not Ghede the Alcoholic are you?”

 

Now I had to laugh “No, I am not an evil spirit or Satan himself here to collect a herd of zombies, nor am I an alcoholic, but I do have something to talk to you about that may interest you.”

 

She poured more wine into my glass. “Oh you mean that damned map!”

 

I gulped the wine in one swallow, my eyes wide in wonder.  “Yes, that damned map.How in hell did you know that?”

 

“That,” she said, “IS voodoo!”

 

I was in shock waiting for my Grand angel to leave my body while my Petit angel and I started slithering as snakes looking for the nearest saloon and whorehouse where female zombies would lead us into good old fashioned Catholic-Voodoo temptation as I would begin my trail ride walking the earth for the next hundred years as one of the undead hobnobbing with hobgoblins…

Chapter 6 - Cajun Voodoo and Jamaican Ganja

 

Cajun Voodoo and Jamaican Ganja

Personal Journal Entry July 28, 1867

Baxter Dooley

A violent determined knock on the front door startled me back from from a half dream of an astral plane the thick red wine and the somewhat Catholic cloud of incense were beginning  to transport me too. Isadora rose from her wicker throne like chair gracefully floating on air or so it seemed due to her long colorful floor length gown of symbols. In her raspy voice that dripped with sensuality she announced in the voice of a prophet…”He’s here.”

 

When the door opened, HE was here. Bathed in the faint full moonlight on the brick porch stood Monty Debauchery. Resplendent in city wear including a bowler hat that would look out of place in Montana, he tipped his topper and introduced himself to my new found voodoo friend. Always wise to have few a few aces from a marked deck and a black magic spell or two to ward off evil up your sleeve. You never know when they’ll come in handy.

 

“Well,” he exclaimed in a loud projecting voice suitable for the theatrical stage production of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” at a school for the deaf, “Baxter, it nice to see you. On two feet that is. I see we have the same intentions for being here so I won’t waste my time nor Isadora’s on small talk.”

 

“I owe you one Monty. My head is still throbbing, but then maybe it’s the wine.”

 

“So, you are Mr. Debauchery,” Isadora interjected feigning surprise. “You have wasted a trip. I haven’t changed my mind. I am not interested in selling, donating or giving up my father’s half of the map, considering the whole map was his in the first place.”

 

Monty smiled and shrugged his shoulders. “Well, I must say you are direct. I can’t buy it from you and you don’t want to be partners. That leaves me one option. An unpleasant one I admit. but under the circumstances, it is my only alternative.”

 

In a split second he produced a silver inlaid Remington derringer.  I wasn’t about to argue. I had my Colt in a shoulder holster making a quick draw near impossible and my death certain. Sometimes retreat is the only option.

 

“I feel you are making a big mistake,” Isadora said.

 

“Don’t you make a mistake. Just because you are a woman doesn’t mean I won’t kill you if you don’t do as I say. Hand over the map and I’ll walk away...no harm to anyone.”

 

A giant bolt of lightning in the form of the largest black man to roam the earth burst into the room and subdued Monty throwing him to the ground. Monty’s face had the look a man has when he is facing a firing squad without a blindfold, only this time his firing squad had arms the size of a water buffalo and his head was completely shorn of hair, yet covered in tattoo’s of various voodoo figures of the astral forces. Mumbo jumbo to me, but was relieved that this rather large spirit in human form was where he was, when he was.

 

I went over to Monty and retrieved the firearm he dropped when he was dropped by a superior force. An unnatural force of nature I might add. I helped Monty to his feet  and searched his waistcoat pocket. Inside the left pocket was his half of the map.

 

“I’ll take this if you have no objections,” I said pointing to the giant standing next to him.

 

Monty, ever the gentleman, made of grand show of dusting himself off, picking up his bowler and bowed low. “I bid you all a good evening. If you think this is over, think again. I’ll be prepared next time. I want that treasure!”

 

“Well, looks like you’re out of luck old boy so climb back under your rock.” I was feeling pretty cocky considering I had the force of Thor in the room backing me up. Monty bowed, ever the gentleman con man then made a hurried hasty retreat into the womb of the New Orleans night.

 

“I’m glad that’s over,” I said with much relief.  I then went up to Thor and introduced myself. He replied with a smile larger than Louisiana speaking excitedly in a patois I couldn’t understand. Isadora came to the rescue.

 

“He is a Haitian and speaks very little English, Mr. Dooley. He is a friend of a friend of mine in Port Au Prince wanted by the police there for murder, self defense I assure you so he was able with the help of friends escape capture and bribed his way here on a boat. He needed a place to stay, and I needed protection. Not everyone understands voodoo and some would have us burned at the stake. His name is Jean-Paul Pelissier.”

 

Self defense? What idiot would dare challenge this mountain? Only one with a death wish I felt.

 

“Now we must go. Mr. Debauchery I fear he will be back with more men. We must go to the village so I may protect us through ceremony and join the others. It will open your eyes Mr. Dooley. It will certainly open your eyes to a whole new dimension!”

 

We left in a hurry, arriving  on foot a mile past the Saint Roch cemetery to “the village” a small conclave of huts in a field along a muddy stream. As we entered people were dancing like whirling dervishes of the Muslim religion in the East. Drums were pounding out an African beat, and great bonfires illuminated the world before us. This was the voodoo village where those whose faith is voodoo live and celebrate and seek protection with the help of spirits. As it turns out, Isadora is their protector through her spells and charms in exchange for gifts of money or items.

 

Not all was voodoo however. Many Jamaicans were living in New Orleans as well and would mix with the Haitians in voodoo ceremony. While Haitians danced and chanted, Jamaicans smoked ganja, Hindi for marijuana. They would settle back with huge pipes and inhale they enjoyed peering through the haze of ganja and the smoke of the ceremonial bonfires.

 

As took a seat on the ground against a rock I watched mesmerized as Isadora created potions and spells for those who sought her help and guidance while Jean-Paul kept a keen watchful eye on the celebrants.   I also made a new friend from Jamaica who sauntered over to my rock, took a seat on the dirt next to me and passed his hand carved pipe filled with ganja to me. It had so been a visit to a city of opium, wine, marijuana and sex. A wonderful land of decadence. It would soon change as Isadora, Jean-Paul and myself would head for Mexico in two days now that we had both halves of the map.

 

We all knew it wouldn’t be an easy trip. Never mind the mountain bandits, Mexican Federales, and Apaches defending their lands we may encounter as we intruded….but...Monty Debauchery was determined to get that treasure,  as he said ‘at any cost’.

 

I didn’t want to worry about that now, The ganja was working it’s magic filling my mind with visions. Voodoo dancers in front of me and steady drumbeats were blending with the bonfires, stars and full moon above. I now felt the power of voodoo...and watched in rapt attention the beautiful Isadora as she performed her priestess duties.  She was right in something she said earlier that was echoing in my head…”Voodoo will open your eyes Mr. Dooley. It will certainly open your eyes to a whole new dimension!”

 

She was right. Even without voodoo, I felt as though she had cast a spell over me. I’d follow her to the edge of the earth if it were flat and jump into the abyss if I had too. First...Mexico, the abyss can wait.

Chapter Seven - The Rio Grande Gang

 

The Rio Grande Gang

(A Chapter from a Buck Bronson Texas Ranger Dime Novel)

By Baxter Dooley

Buck Bronson and the Texas Rangers rode there horses hard and were hot on the trail of the bloody Rio Grande Gang led by the notorious Trigger Finger Dan as they raced to the Mexican border near Laredo. Their intent was  to deliver a wagon load f stolen U.S. Cavalry  rifles and ammo to the Mexican bandits in exchange for pesos and gold.  The rifles were the latest death dealing military Springfield Model 1870’s with .45 caliber bullets packing enough power to hold off  any Mexican government posse who dared face the blazing barrels of the notorious Mexican bandit gangs who controlled the countryside and mountain regions.

 

After they delivered the cargo of firepower  and collected their ill gotten money and gold, Trigger Finger and his gang would cross the  border to whoop it up south of the border spending every crooked peso on cheap whiskey and even cheaper wenches  in Monterey miles  away from the Tex-Mex border towns where the long arm of the Texas lawdogs  might attempt a daring raid to capture the outlaw gang. If that happened the would surely  face a Hanging Judge Parker trial and it was an inevitable outcome where they would walk up the wooden steps of the gallows to swing high in the hot and dusty Texas sun to meet their maker face to face before they would spend an eternity in the fires of Hades with other fast guns.

 

Buck was the first to spot the outlaws and the wagon load of stolen guns. “There they are boys,” he yelled to the Rangers. “It’s now or never!” Guns began to blaze and smoke filled the air. Trigger Fingers gang took refuge in the red rock formations and returned fire. The wagon of weapons turned towards the shelter of the rocks too hard and a wagon wheel broke as the wagon teetered and turned over scattering  wooden boxes of rifles and ammunition in four directions.

 

The Rangers faced fierce fire from the outlaws bringing two of them down in a hail of bullets. It was anybody’s guess now as to who would win the battle. Would Trigger Finger Dan face frontier justice? Or would Buck Bronson and the Rangers be wiped out and left for dead in the dust?

(Baxter Dooley - 1867)

 

(Letter from Isadora Lavolier to her sister in Baton Rouge, Louisiana - July 30, 1867)

Dearest Tia,

Tomorrow I leave New Orleans for Mexico with a Mr. Baxter Dooley (I’ll explain later who he is, once I figure it out myself!) and of course Jean-Paul with whom I feel safe at all times.

 

Remember Papa’s map? Thanks to Baxter we now have both halves of it not that it really matters.  Now I have a chance to fulfill Papa’s dream by finding the lost treasure.

We leave on the morning  tide by sail to Mexico. We are going with  a good Cajun captain, Mr. Marcel, a friend of Papa’s. You remember him I’m sure. He would always bring us candy and gifts after his journeys.  Smuggling, Papa always said. Imagine, Mr. Marcel, a pirate smuggler!

 

We plan on making landfall near Vera Cruz and by land from there once we purchase horses and supplies. We want to look like gringo prospectors looking for small nuggets of gold in a stream and Lord not the lost treasures of Coronado. Just crazy American gringos. What a surprise it will be if we find it!!! Of course I will share my portion with you.

 

I anticipate Monty Debauchery will try to follow us and take the treasure once we lead him to it, I’m sure he memorized his half of the map as clearly as a school child learns his scripture. I’m counting on it. His half had the route leading north from Mexico City, so he probably has already gotten wind of our plans and I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s not on his way to Mexico City right now and will head well north ahead of us to intercept our trail and follow from there. I’m hoping this is the case.

 

Well, dear sister, I must close for now and get some rest. I only pray that my magic will be a match for the Aztec gods, should they get angry with us! Baxter is worried about bandits, I worry about other forces unseen.

 

Take care and I will contact you when we return.

All my love, Isadora.

Chapter Eight - The Cruise to Vera Cruz

The haunted harbor of neurotic New Orleans was already teeming with steamships being loaded by quiet Negro workers who were most recently servile livestock under the plantation lash prior to Emancipation, now freed slaves of only a short time,  loading bulging bales of King Cotton aboard ships due to set sail for the East Coast and England and it’s factories.

 

Isadora, Jean-Paul and myself awoke early, (too nervous to sleep soundly the night before anyway)  to meet the flamboyant pirate-smuggler-ancient mariner Captain Marcel to begin our seaward  journey to Mexico’s Vera Cruz aboard his sloop ‘The Creole’. She was a sleek, fast ship called a ‘New York’ sloop measuring in at 40’ long with a wide stern and a simple jib and mainsail with a large boom.

 

I couldn’t help but notice Isadora looking  ravishing and as radiant as an exploding planet out of the latest Jules Verne books I had just read. Space travel? Trips to the moon? To the center of Earth?  Around to World in a Balloon? Ludicrous! We are not gods of mythology or folly!!

 

The morning sun was bathing her in a golden hue. Her jet black hair was smooth and had a lustre I had overlooked before. It was the sky of night holding the secrets of the stars and heaven. Her bronze bayou skin took on the sheen of those delicious caramels that I used to buy by the bagful in a candy store  in Boston. Tiny beads of sweat were forming on her supple neck as a result of the already rising humidity of the steamy New Orleans morning. She wore a short print skirt along with a sheer blouse of lightly woven cotton that was clinging to her skin thanks to the humid conditions giving way to a veiled view of small firm brown breasts slightly  visible behind the cotton curtain that made me hunger for more caramel candy.

 

Jean-Paul, could have been an attraction at a traveling medicine show preceding a sermon of a fire and brimstone preacher under the big top of a tent revival leading the faithful to slaughter as sure as any Old Testament sacrifice.

 

He course was always  looming nearby protecting Isadora, so better I avert my gaze lest he use the blessed by blood machete he always carried with him to send me to an untimely demise. We were all in a hearty mood as we boarded the ‘Creole’ and set our packs neatly on deck. We were going after treasure which alone would have us in a great mood. Add to that the deep blue waters of the Gulf of Mexico waiting to engulf us in her beauty as we would be carried across her warm waters to Old Mexico and the promise of Spanish stolen Aztec-Toltec gold.  All things considered, you have the perfect conditions for adventure.

 

“She may get a little choppy out there, but I can assure you, ‘The Creole’ is one strong lady and has taken on high seas before. She be as strong as the one legged whore with one green eye I knew when sailing me bigger ship to the Gold Coast of Africa during the slave trade,” Captain Marcel roared laughing. “God spare me. The things she could do with only one leg would kill a man if she had two!”

 

I had to admit. The Captain was a pirate at heart and used to keep two colored  female slaves he bought at auction in the African market aboard his slave trade schooner as entertainment. He eventually sold them in Mobile, Alabama to a bawdy house catering to sailors. “There’s more where they came from,” he told his first mate. Seems Captain Marcel wanted a fresh supply just to keep himself interested. “I bought them from the negro traders who sold their own kind. Imagine, coloreds selling other coloreds! It was cheaper than buying from the whites.”

 

We were now ready to set a course and leave the cacophony of the harbor behind us. A crazy pirate/smuggler at the helm, transporting a  voodoo vixen of a queen of New Orleans, her trusted bodyguard who  had so many tattoos I felt we could hang him in the finest art gallery in all of Europe as a work of art, and me, a dime novel writer of pulp. A ragged trio  heading into Mexico with it’s roving bands of bandits in the countryside while revolution was at the throats of Emperor Maximilian, the faux leader of Mexico placed in power by the victorious French.  Foremost in my mind however was the fact that Monty Debauchery and his Canadian gang of outlaws would be on our trail.

 

Hopefully those stories regarding angry Aztec spirits were just that, stories.

Chapter Nine - Soiled Doves & Painted Ladies

 

The Soiled Doves and Painted Ladies of Camptown

An ‘Outlaw Kitty Stetson and the Bordello Gang’ Dime Novel Excerpt

By Baxter Dooley

Kitty Stetson and her female gang of ex-saloon and bordello girls were the scourge of Texas in the late 1860’s. While the James Gang and the Daltons specialized in robbing trains and banks, Kitty and company held every saloonkeeper and bordello madam in every Texas border town at gunpoint while they cleared the den of sin of greenbacks and silver dollars. They also used this opportunity to recruit fresh female gang members from the camptown ladies who worked the red light districts and had had enough of can-can do dah do dah with every dusty cowpoke fresh off the Chisholm trail who came galloping into town with a money belt bulging with legal tender to gamble, drink and to camp it up in Camptown with the soiled doves and painted ladies.

 

Kitty was one herself fulfilling a contract she had made with the devil. In this case the devil was her husband Flint Barstow, a con artist and saloon owner in Brownsville, Texas. He promised her the world, but that world ended up in beatings and his constant  cheating on her with the other girls. One night after the saloon had closed she walked behind the bar and grabbed Flint’s pistol he always kept handy. All six chambers were loaded.

 

She walked up the stairs to the room where Flint was in bed with the new redhead girl  from Illinois he had just contracted for. The door opened slowly and the light from the oil lamp was burning low but she could make out Flints body under the covers while the redhead from Chicago was cleaning herself at the wash basin.

 

The next thing Kitty knew...the gun went off...all six shots filling Flints prone body as it jerked with each penetrating slug. The redhead screamed and turned in alarm, her movement forcing the wash basin to the floor with a crash.

 

“There, that’s the end of that,” is all Kitty said as the smoke cleared. She helped the redhead calm down and consoled her. It was a fateful moment in both of their lives. They were free from their contracts and downstairs in the money box there was loot enough to get away before the sheriff came to investigate and make an arrest.

 

They hurried back upstairs and took off their feminine finery and traded them in for pants, snap shirts and boots and bandanas from Flint’s closet. On their way outside to steal two horses to make their getaway, they grabbed two more guns and boxes of ammo when Kitty remembered Flints prized possession...his black stetson with silver inlays. “I’ll take this too as a reminder of that dirty dog!”

 

That is how Kitty got her name. It was also the beginning of a spree of saloon robberies along the Tex-Mex border. When the Texas Rangers came riding hard, the Bordello Gang would simply dash across the border into the safety of Mexico.

---- Baxter Dooley----

Personal Journal Entry

Baxter Dooley - August 3, 1867

The Tex-Mex Mex-Tex Border was always a wild and wooly region.  In fact the entire Mexican country was in turmoil this year. Rebels were fighting to oust the French usurpers who stole the throne on behalf of Napoleon the Third along with tensions mounting at the border over jurisdiction. Always a murky line in the Rio Grande sand.

 

We were slowly sailing across the Gulf of Mexico aboard the ‘Creole’ with our plan to make landfall just north of Vera Cruz. We would draw too much attention pulling into port with the ever watchful eye of the Mexican army just waiting for  a ship load of gringos. Our main worry was Fort San Juan de Ulúa which overlooked the entire harbor, built originally as a fortress against 17th Century pirates intent on plunder.

 

We were now de facto pirates ourselves in search for the lost treasure of a lost civilization. We decided to anchor offshore, out of town and out of sight.  From the ‘Creole’ Captain Marcel would row us to shore and let us off where we would disappear into the Mexican landscape and the town of Vera Cruz.

 

As jumped into the surf with our canvas packs. Marcel yelled out, “Bonne Chance” Good luck. We’d need it. If the Mexicans knew we were after treasure, we’d be standing against the wall of Fort San Juan blindfolded and shot full of holes so we could pass for Swiss Cheese after being held in a damp, dark dungeon with rats and lice.

 

It was this reality facing me as the three of us reached the dirt road leading away from the beach to take us into the violent vortex of Vera Cruz. I’d give anything for the safety and peace of mind found at night in a Chinese opium den with a kimono clad celestial angel.

Chapter Ten - Peyote & Invisible Pinatas

 

 

Personal Journal Entry - August 3, 1867

Baxter Dooley

Upon entering Vera Cruz on foot we found it to be a metropolitan tapestry of cultures and history that range from pre-Columbian Toltec and it’s gilded golden age of ritual and human sacrifice to the pomposity of  today’s ruling French imperialist regime well under attack by Mexican nationals. Napoleon the III it seems will meet his Waterloo here in Mexico. He won’t last much longer.

 

We must have been a sight to the casual observer. Three odd looking gringos on foot emerging from out of nowhere looking dusty and tired. We needed food, liquid and a bath. Although I must admit the musk Isadora was emitting was fueling my senses. This was going to be a long trip!

 

We checked into a small hotel with cantina. There were only two rooms left so Isadora and Jean-Paul checked into one and I alone in the other. If I played my marked deck of hormonal cards right, I wouldn’t be alone for the night. A  5 dollar gold piece will assure you a bed companion to keep you company until the sun came up the next morning.

 

After I freshened up I went next door to their room. Turns out it wasn’t what I thought. Jean-Paul ever the protector and gentleman would sleep on the floor while Isadora slumbered in the bed. Jean-Paul was not a voodoo sentry...he was Sir Galahad with a patois!.

 

I told them I was going to look around Vera Cruz and see what I could find out about buying three horses and a couple of mules. Other supplies for panning and cooking on the trail would be necessary as would some dried beans, sourdough, salted pork and other foodstuffs to feed the body while gold feed our quest.

 

I left the hotel with every intention of fulfilling the mission I had set for myself but was waylaid by temptation in the person of a Mexican guide who befriended me almost immediately and promised to show me the best Mexico had to offer a gringo such as myself.

 

I didn’t know at the time but this would be an afternoon and evening I would never forget.  

When the Spanish Conquistadors landed in the New World  they hoped to find gold and glory during their adventures in the Americas. They found some of that but they also found a strange  plant used by natives as a religious sacrament and revered almost as a god which the natives called "peyotl," or peyote.

Peyote is a small, spineless cactus growing in the deserts of Mexico and the American Southwest. When properly prepared it is a small button like object which is chewed. The result is an artillery explosion of visions and hallucinations that would run neck and neck in a horse race against opium. We ate the buttons and within a half hour…I was already a high priest of some forgotten native Toltec sect  when I  walked through  the dust and  hot sun baked town. I felt  as dusty and tired as the old siesta men already asleep against adobe buildings. Mystical mandalas appeared as the peyote effects caused them to swirl in the air.

The peyote  massaged me  with gentle fingers of hallucination as the dust swirled at my feet as we, my guide, Gallego’s and I  entered the hotel cantina where I had a room and ordered drinks. Soon I felt as though I was  circumnavigating my  own private Polar Ice Caps, past giant icebergs, round and round the Cape we go, circular explorations they were, easy to negotiate, except for those 90 degree corners of fleeting reality that appeared only as more hallucinations obscuring what they really were. Those recesses, the corners, the 90 degree forks in the road, were illuminated in deep shadows pulsating and twitching in orgasmic release as the tequila I was now drinking in the cantina, had wormed it's way home to the grand nerve central station, exposing the masks of drunkards and dope fiends.

 

I looked around, my head spinning around and then...I stumbled, I tumbled and swore as I fell, face down passed out. Dreaming drunk, vivid and vibrant, I was outside my body watching myself as I walked the dog of Chihuahua through the desert of the same name. The desert, now deserted except for colors and  fragrances of night time, dreamtime  blooms. I could have been snorin’ in Sonora with a senora or senorita or two pesos, but instead travelled in suspended animation through  fields of  cactus cosmos astride a  white buffalo of lore and myth.

 

Soon I was assailed by the sounds of laughter and unfamiliar dialects, and in my dream state I walked outside, falling off a cloud into the center of town with the dust swirling like little dusty tornados created by little brown feet belonging to the little brown kids of the little brown Mexican village who danced delirious in the  dirt of the dusty plaza near the mission of Saint San Shit or something or other.

 

There was a band playing in my mind, a peyote  band in colorful dress, mariachi music was performed while a man in tight bullfighter pants danced a  flamenco with a flamingo of dubious gender on the table, the flamingo could talk when not drunk  on too much tequila. Then the trumpets, blaring out festive fiesta music with a serape serenade for sweet scheherazades, with wave after wave of music, like lyrical tsunamis crashing to shore, deep inland and further yet to reach the quiet coves and  caves. In my dream, or someone’s dream, can't remember now, I stood alone, with all the others, fixed in place fixated on all  the other prisoners of so many religions, where we were all surrounded by by anxious urchins, begging, imploring to fill the pinata with more peyote and tequila dreams.

 

I lowered the mache of paper to the dusty ground below, filled it, packed it like a pirates cannon full of shrapnel words, not in any particular or peculiar order of sentence or structure of any kind. Then it was raised by the numerous Pablitos by its frayed rope high above the blindfolded assemblage who couldn’t wait to swing a stick at it. Sticks swang and swung and swinged, wildly, no hits, until one connected with a direct hit as words, so many of them, fell from the punctured pinata complete with punctuation, like so many pieces of pretty candy flying out without wings in every direction. It was an explosive array of metaphors, verbs, and nouns. As a writer I marvelled at the cascade of the english language as it fell not to the ground, lost in the dust at first, but later found sanctuary on the  pages of a pulp western novel I would write.  Meanwhile, the children, the smart ones, not the adults, gathered up the little candy like words together, and together they spent the morning forming sentences and paragraphs until the no-sense finally made sense,.

 

Soon in my dream my eyes became heavy with drink and peyote and I had to rest. Gallegos and another fellow carried me upstairs and said they would meet me the next day to buy some quality horses and pack mules I must have mentioned we needed.

 

 

Then in the quiet of my room, I dreamed I laid the invisible book on the invisible table next me and was glad to sleep. The alcohol and peyote were wearing off as the plaza and the pinata began to fade from view and my reach. Voices disappeared too until there was only a loud silences. Then I doubled over and threw up….

 

Next Day

The sun rose in the east as I suppose it feels it has to, that is what we hired it for after all. It warmed my face as I sat up, refreshed in spirit with a hollow stomach. Sitting in the corner, quiet as a saint was Jean-Paul. He motioned for me to get up as it was time to head out. he and Isadora heard about my night from the hotel host and were now going to watch me like a hawk at night.

 

I had splashed rancid brown water on my face and grabbed my backpack by the bedstead and joined Isadora and Jean-Paul who both laughed at the wreck I must have been. We were looking for Gallegos as we walked through the sleepy village and down the sleepy road where even the dogs were too lazy to bark at us. Jean-Paul surprised me with a rolled stick of marijuana he had.

 

 

As we passed it back and forth I spotted Gallegos waving at us. “That my dear friends is Gallegos. He can get us fixed up with horses and pack mules.” To which Isadora replied “Let’s go meet him then….we have treasure to find!” Treasure, si...that would be nice. Right now...I needed a drink. I could see Jean-Paul read my thoughts...his look told me “the cantina can wait!”

Chapter 11 - Mexican Dreams of Gold & Gods

 

 

Personal Journal Entry

Baxter Dooley - August 4, 1867

Our journey through the desert lands and sands of Mexico would become  that of two madmen and one mad voodoo queen with Mexican dreams of treasure. We were doomed in our quest without gravitational attachment to hold us on orbit in this mystic region alive with critters that skitter and ochre orgasms dripping  from the  skies, rainbows would arch and frame the desert, painting the  landscape with  colors..sunsets, orange and brilliant would fill in the empty spaces in between abodes of adobe  The bleached white of a mission jesus on a crucifix in the church of San Zen beneath the sky of azure, I assure you, is vibrant with cream clouds of mystic consistency and turquoise laughter.

The rocks are red, canyons and arroyos in muddy rio swirls with smokey old white haired mountains rising above fields of lava flows, ancient and old…their tops blown off. With grass and trees adding their colors of life to the harsh barren sides and images of black and white and grey suspended in the mind riddled by a Gatling gun firing stars as bullets to rip the flesh, meteors and comets racing through the void..looking to call attention to our deception and perception of reality..fade to black of night...the colors hide until sunrise…colors can be deceiving when hidden in a cloak of darkness.


The Mexican desert is alive with pastels  aligned in secret conspiracy while this macabre dichotomy of life-art rages quietly, it conquered the hearts and dreams and fostered schemes of cool conquistadores, including the king of cibola cool, Coronado and his quest for seven cities of gold. Later, in time, the region would become awash with the gringo’s with tall tales of lore and legendary figures  competing  in the open air market of Mexico City and it’s  madness and madmen and mayhem, ahem…amen……with the cowboys entering the saloons where soiled doves in can-can boxing matches and prostitutes racing in the streets for the sports as the players placed their bets on the naked runners…win, place or show more flesh.

Drunks, bad whiskey and worse, the crowd goes wild with approving applause and they can’t get enough of the wild west firing off mirthful salvos from a pearl handled six shooters with silver city bullets packed lethally with equal measure of angst and lead, unchecked and unbalanced, left handed, right handed, guns blasting away with the ferocity and velocity of Mr. Gatlings gun..letting loose an orgasmic ejaculation of hot lead and death.

 

This was the roadmap of the landscape ahead of us. Colorful and deadly. The desert is one and the same. We were ready to leave Vera Cruz now that we had purchased some fine looking horses and three pack mules that we hoped wouldn’t die on us laden with gold and silver. Gallegos who had arranged this also offered to go along as guide. I could tell he could smell treasure and not merely a few nuggets of gold panned from some washed out stream. We talked it over and agreed...It might not be a bad idea to have him along but to not tell him of the real reason for our quest until we were well underway.

 

We had the horses saddled and mules packed. “To Mexico City Amigos,” I cried out when Isadora held her finger to her lips signaling me to be quiet as she walked over to me and in a low voice informed me, “We’re not going to Mexico City. We’re heading south. We’re going to the Yucatan region.”

 

I was confused, “But the maps clearly indicated to head north from the city.” That is when she pulled out an old leather bound journal her father had kept. Amidst the pages of notes and drawings was a map, clearly showing a southerly route to Yucatan. “I don’t understand. What’s this?”

 

“Father never trusted anyone. He made up the other map but kept the real map here in his private journal. The map Debauchery has shows a journey north and turns to the left to the reach the area where the treasure should be, but  If you turn that map upside down...it shows a journey south and turns to the right...where Yucatan would be.”

 

I had to give the old guy credit. It was brilliant. The map Debauchery had would lead him on a wild goose chase in the wrong direction. He’d be waiting to ambush us hundreds of miles away while we loaded up with the real treasure!

 

Jean-Paul was smiling broadly at me. I had to laugh and marvel at the ingenuity of the ruse. “C’mon Gallegos. Let’s get moving. Change of plans I said slyly. We mounted our horses and rode slowly out of town...for the Yucatan.

 

What we hadn’t figured on was that Monty Debauchery was not as dumb as we thought as we were to find  out later. He had anticipated a double cross. He knew we were heading to Vera Cruz via the Gulf and not by land as that was the quickest route. Thanks to a dock worker who knew Captain Marcel he was paid handsomely for information that gave Monty the upper hand. He had spies everywhere and this one on the docks would sell his sister to for a silver dollar to a gang of drunken Canadian lumberjacks.

 

Monty and his gang booked another boat and were already in Vera Cruz when we arrived. He kept the gang well hidden blending in with the populous but with an ever watchful eye on us and our movements. Which made me wonder when he finally set up his ambush once we were on the trail...was Gallegos fate or fortune? Meaning would our deaths be our fate while the treasure became Monty’s fortune.

 

A religious man would fall to his knees as a penitent and pray to God. But….which one? We’re in Mexico now and there plenty to choose from. Aztec gods...Mayan gods,...Sun gods….blood gods….mission gods….and imported from New Orleans. A voodoo god or two complete with spells and curses thanks to Isadora at no extra charge. On this journey my God was a  was a sixteen shot .44 caliber Henry rifle! With a good rifle...you get religion that packs a punch!

Chapter 12 - Napoleon Blown Apart

Personal Journal Entry - August 10, 1867
The cacophony of the tools of the prospector jangled as the pack mules made steady stride  behind our horses. Pans clanging a cadence in a confused concerto of tin pans and picks and shovels announcing our arrival to anyone a half mile away as we passed through a canyon just south of Campeche in the Yucatan Peninsula. Our target, the Chichen Itza pyramid where the rivers run underground in the arid landscape of this Mayan land where sacrifice to the rain god Chaac was routine ritual where a virgin didn’t lose her virginity...she lost her life, and Mayan warriors were one bride-to-be short of a full deck at all times.

“Monty would be chasing his tail about now looking for Aztec gold,” I whispered to Jean-Paul who in his solid, stoic way nodded in agreement. He was a rock of granite and I would hate to play poker against him in a game of five card draw. He’d win the pot hands down until all you had left was your boots and long underwear!

It was downright clever of Mr. Lavolier to produce an upside down map leading in the wrong direction to Aztec gold, when all along it was Mayan gold we were seeking by merely turning the map upside down pointing out the X marks the spot location where the real quest would lead.

As we were about to emerge from the canyon rifle shots were raining bullets from the bluffs above while horsemen rode up at a furious pace from behind. We had no choice but to stand and fight or be cut down one by one.

We took to some rocks that would suffice as a fortress until our ammo ran out or were victorious against who, we weren’t sure until the firing stopped momentarily and voice in Spanish broke the tension in the air. “Senors, you are trespassing. There is a toll to be paid. All we want is your money. You will be unharmed. The odds are against you, so put down your weapons, we can do this peacefully.”

Bandits! Terrific! A few peso’s is all we had left. If they took the horses we were sunk. All our efforts would be for nothing. “Come down. We know we’re outnumbered and out guned so let’s do this peacefully. We mean no harm either,” I blurted out on behalf of our small band of what must appear to be a strange foursome of fearless interlopers.

The bandit chief came down from the cliffs on a trail astride a beautiful paint stallion with his grizzled bunch of pistoleros following his lead. Those who were firing from behind also came forward on foot.

You could tell who the leader was, he still had a full set of teeth as white as an Italianate alabaster statue of some holy divinity. He also had the largest sombrero and wore two belts of bullets criss crossing his chest. He could probably hold off Bloody Bill Anderson in his prime during the Civil War.

He went so far as to introduce himself which I felt was a civilized touch not readily found among the outlaw breed. “I am known as El Diablo, my friends. Sorry for this inconvenience but it is necessary you see.” Isadora waved a retreat hand signal to Jean-Paul who was coiled like an Oklahoma rattlesnake, even though the odds were clearly against him, and us. Never take a machete to a gun fight! It also struck me that every third bandit in Mexico was called El Diablo or El Lobo in an obvious attempt to strike fear in the hearts of the peasants and Federales.

“We’re just passing through. We heard there is gold in the mountains so wish to try our luck,” Isadora broke in.  The bandits broke out in laughter “Gold? In these mountains? I think you would do better up north near Mexico City. Not here. We have never heard of anyone finding one tiny nugget, but of course is your choice. Now hand over your money and any jewelry and we will be on our way.” He was a man of his word I could tell.

Gallegos said something in Spanish that irritated El Diablo. “Your Mexican friend is protesting on your behalf. A worthy trait. Loyalty I respect, so I won’t kill him for his insolence!” How gracious of him!

Just then we heard the thunder of hundreds of hoofs riding hard through the canyon. We soon learned they were members of the French Expeditionary Forces sent to bolster the regime of Emperor Napoleon III who was the real bandit in Mexico having seized power thanks to a treaty between France, Spain and the UK. His government was under attack by Mexican rebels and government forces everywhere using force to squash the uprising. It turns out that our new “host” el Diablo was not merely a bandito, but was the leader of a rebel faction in the Yucatan region keeping government forces occupied far from the capital while other rebels assailed  Mexico City and tried to gain victory in securing the forts and ports on the eastern coast.

El Diablos men joined us in our makeshift rock fortress as we all exchanged gunfire in the battle of our lives. French tabatiere rifles versus Springfield’s and Henry’s were no match and we were achieving success at holding our own against the might of France.

“El Diablo,” I yelled. “Cover me!” He and his men laid down a blanket of fire that was deafening. As the French dug in deeper to avoid certain death, I made a mad dash to the saddlebags on my horse extracting what I wanted and dashed ducking low back to our shelter. I was smiling as I held up 5 sticks of dynamite I had sandbagged for the trip. Mainly to clear any obstructions that may hinder our obtaining access to our pyramid of dreams.

I handed one to El Diablo and both lit one each and lobbed them into to French forces who were stacked in formation as neat as a pile of cordwood in snow country. The explosions did the trick. Our group took advantage of the confusion of the French going on the offensive as the French panicked at the thought of being beheaded or worse so far from Bordeaux and its wine and the amore found in the  arms of a French mademoiselle in Marseille.  

We attacked, they fled.  Battle won. We were all silent at first. Fear replaced by victory. El Diablo looked at me and burst into a laugh that echoed through the canyons. “Senor, I have to hand it to you. You are a rogue! That was magnifico!!!”

I smiled, bowed as though I were an actor on the stage. “I was saving those, but I felt the time was right to use a fuse or two!”

We exchanged pleasantries and the Mexicans provided some tequila from their saddlebags. “Here, we don’t need your money or jewelry. We will find other means to finance our cause.” As they began to return it I looked at the others and in silence we all agreed. “No, please. Keep it. You need it and we are happy to help.”

That night in the canyon we started a cooking fire and shared our food while they shared what food they had and of course more tequila. The stars were brilliant that night. Gallegos who had been quiet as a mission mouse broke out his guitar and we sat placid under the heavens to the strains and songs of Mexico.

Isadora was sitting next to me. Maybe it was the stars….perhaps the music….or could have been the tequila. She gave me kiss on the cheek and allowed me to put my arm around her as she rested her head on my chest.

I quickly looked at Jean-Paul. Instead of impersonating a statue, he smiled and raised his tin cup of tequila as a toast to me. I was relieved. I didn’t want my drunken head rolling in the desert dust after it was severed by meeting his protective machete!

Isadora I swear could read my mind! “Hush. Enjoy the moment. The spirits are happy.” Good I thought. If the spirits were happy, then I was happy!

 

Chapter 13 - Posse Heat at Bad Rock Bluff

 

Personal Journal Entry - August 10, 1867
The cacophony of the tools of the prospector jangled as the pack mules made steady stride  behind our horses. Pans clanging a cadence in a confused concerto of tin pans and picks and shovels announcing our arrival to anyone a half mile away as we passed through a canyon just south of Campeche in the Yucatan Peninsula. Our target, the Chichen Itza pyramid where the rivers run underground in the arid landscape of this Mayan land where sacrifice to the rain god Chaac was routine ritual where a virgin didn’t lose her virginity...she lost her life, and Mayan warriors were one bride-to-be short of a full deck at all times.

“Monty would be chasing his tail about now looking for Aztec gold,” I whispered to Jean-Paul who in his solid, stoic way nodded in agreement. He was a rock of granite and I would hate to play poker against him in a game of five card draw. He’d win the pot hands down until all you had left was your boots and long underwear!

It was downright clever of Mr. Lavolier to produce an upside down map leading in the wrong direction to Aztec gold, when all along it was Mayan gold we were seeking by merely turning the map upside down pointing out the X marks the spot location where the real quest would lead.

As we were about to emerge from the canyon rifle shots were raining bullets from the bluffs above while horsemen rode up at a furious pace from behind. We had no choice but to stand and fight or be cut down one by one.

We took to some rocks that would suffice as a fortress until our ammo ran out or were victorious against who, we weren’t sure until the firing stopped momentarily and voice in Spanish broke the tension in the air. “Senors, you are trespassing. There is a toll to be paid. All we want is your money. You will be unharmed. The odds are against you, so put down your weapons, we can do this peacefully.”

Bandits! Terrific! A few peso’s is all we had left. If they took the horses we were sunk. All our efforts would be for nothing. “Come down. We know we’re outnumbered and out guned so let’s do this peacefully. We mean no harm either,” I blurted out on behalf of our small band of what must appear to be a strange foursome of fearless interlopers.

The bandit chief came down from the cliffs on a trail astride a beautiful paint stallion with his grizzled bunch of pistoleros following his lead. Those who were firing from behind also came forward on foot.

You could tell who the leader was, he still had a full set of teeth as white as an Italianate alabaster statue of some holy divinity. He also had the largest sombrero and wore two belts of bullets criss crossing his chest. He could probably hold off Bloody Bill Anderson in his prime during the Civil War.

He went so far as to introduce himself which I felt was a civilized touch not readily found among the outlaw breed. “I am known as El Diablo, my friends. Sorry for this inconvenience but it is necessary you see.” Isadora waved a retreat hand signal to Jean-Paul who was coiled like an Oklahoma rattlesnake, even though the odds were clearly against him, and us. Never take a machete to a gun fight! It also struck me that every third bandit in Mexico was called El Diablo or El Lobo in an obvious attempt to strike fear in the hearts of the peasants and Federales.

“We’re just passing through. We heard there is gold in the mountains so wish to try our luck,” Isadora broke in.  The bandits broke out in laughter “Gold? In these mountains? I think you would do better up north near Mexico City. Not here. We have never heard of anyone finding one tiny nugget, but of course is your choice. Now hand over your money and any jewelry and we will be on our way.” He was a man of his word I could tell.

Gallegos said something in Spanish that irritated El Diablo. “Your Mexican friend is protesting on your behalf. A worthy trait. Loyalty I respect, so I won’t kill him for his insolence!” How gracious of him!

Just then we heard the thunder of hundreds of hoofs riding hard through the canyon. We soon learned they were members of the French Expeditionary Forces sent to bolster the regime of Emperor Napoleon III who was the real bandit in Mexico having seized power thanks to a treaty between France, Spain and the UK. His government was under attack by Mexican rebels and government forces everywhere using force to squash the uprising. It turns out that our new “host” el Diablo was not merely a bandito, but was the leader of a rebel faction in the Yucatan region keeping government forces occupied far from the capital while other rebels assailed  Mexico City and tried to gain victory in securing the forts and ports on the eastern coast.

El Diablos men joined us in our makeshift rock fortress as we all exchanged gunfire in the battle of our lives. French tabatiere rifles versus Springfield’s and Henry’s were no match and we were achieving success at holding our own against the might of France.

“El Diablo,” I yelled. “Cover me!” He and his men laid down a blanket of fire that was deafening. As the French dug in deeper to avoid certain death, I made a mad dash to the saddlebags on my horse extracting what I wanted and dashed ducking low back to our shelter. I was smiling as I held up 5 sticks of dynamite I had sandbagged for the trip. Mainly to clear any obstructions that may hinder our obtaining access to our pyramid of dreams.

I handed one to El Diablo and both lit one each and lobbed them into to French forces who were stacked in formation as neat as a pile of cordwood in snow country. The explosions did the trick. Our group took advantage of the confusion of the French going on the offensive as the French panicked at the thought of being beheaded or worse so far from Bordeaux and its wine and the amore found in the  arms of a French mademoiselle in Marseille.  

We attacked, they fled.  Battle won. We were all silent at first. Fear replaced by victory. El Diablo looked at me and burst into a laugh that echoed through the canyons. “Senor, I have to hand it to you. You are a rogue! That was magnifico!!!”

I smiled, bowed as though I were an actor on the stage. “I was saving those, but I felt the time was right to use a fuse or two!”

We exchanged pleasantries and the Mexicans provided some tequila from their saddlebags. “Here, we don’t need your money or jewelry. We will find other means to finance our cause.” As they began to return it I looked at the others and in silence we all agreed. “No, please. Keep it. You need it and we are happy to help.”

That night in the canyon we started a cooking fire and shared our food while they shared what food they had and of course more tequila. The stars were brilliant that night. Gallegos who had been quiet as a mission mouse broke out his guitar and we sat placid under the heavens to the strains and songs of Mexico.

Isadora was sitting next to me. Maybe it was the stars….perhaps the music….or could have been the tequila. She gave me kiss on the cheek and allowed me to put my arm around her as she rested her head on my chest.

I quickly looked at Jean-Paul. Instead of impersonating a statue, he smiled and raised his tin cup of tequila as a toast to me. I was relieved. I didn’t want my drunken head rolling in the desert dust after it was severed by meeting his protective machete!

Isadora I swear could read my mind! “Hush. Enjoy the moment. The spirits are happy.” Good I thought. If the spirits were happy, then I was happy!

Chapter 14 - Saloons & Balloons in Campeche

 

Campeche was larger than we thought,  alive with colorful ristras framing adobe doorways with a rich,  deep sangria red. Guitars were celebrating in the cantinas with folk songs expressing  hope for the future as well as plaintive melodies of lost loves. These were a diverse native people composed of many layers of culture over the ages giving them a certain uniqueness not found in your average American cowtown of anglo wranglers.

On the trail, we first spotted Campeche in the distant. A brilliant bright mirage ascending the hillsides that nestled this wonderful coastal city. We were hot and thirsty after hours on the hoof and the cool waters of the Gulf of Mexico was a welcome sight.
We were startled suddenly by one of the strangest sights that seemed out of place. A gas filled balloon floating just over head, descending fast to bounce to earth a half mile outside Campeche. Most of our group had never seen a balloon floating silently in the sky. I had.

During the war. Our side and the Confederates had observation balloons involved in many battles to direct cannon fire and to report on enemy positions so the commanders could more effectively devise strategy for victory. This balloon was strangely out of place. The war had ended two years prior and this was Mexico, not Richmond, but it clearly was marked in large letters C.S.A.!

We rushed over to where it had landed and bounced, finally settling with the basket lying on it’s side and it’s pilot some 6 feet away having been thrown by the impact.

As we approached the tangled mess, a man wearing a faded and torn Confederate uniform rose to his feet and in the best example of Southern pride, dusted himself off as if nothing was out of the ordinary and introduced himself. “Greetings gentlemen,” and noticing Isadora among our number, “and dear lady, I am Thaddeus Beauregard, formerly of the Balloon Corps of President Jefferson Davis.”

El Diablo began laughing, which was the cue for his men to join in the jocularity of the moment. “We are pleased to meet you Senor. That flying machine of yours, you can fly like an eagle and see all around, yes?”

“Yes, young man you can. Which brings me to the reason I made a rather botched landing here. I wanted to warn you that there are approximately 30 men riding hard on your trail 20 miles or so back.”

Gallegos spoke next. “Gringo’s?”

“Yes, gringos. I was able to observe them when I floated into the area quite by accident. Soon the winds brought me here and saw you. Don’t know if you have anything to do with them, but wanted to warn you anyway. Can’t be too careful these days, you know.”

El Diablo, ever the skeptic, asked without masking his wariness, “Why are you flying around Mexico. Looking for colorful parrots?”

“No my friend, if truth be told I am searching the Yucatan for pyramids and any other sign of ancient life and times. I have a theory,” he said lowering his voice, why I don’t know. “You see some treasure hunters have been in the region before and never found any gold, silver, diamonds or rubies, but, they have found strange carvings on cave walls of sky ships the likes of which no one today has ever seen. These carvings are not of balloons, no sir. They have strange shapes and not of this world. They tell me they are myths born of Mayan beliefs in gods from the sky. I say they are not myths, but realities, so I am searching for the truth. If I find treasure in the meantime that will be a bonus!”

“Now wait just onedamned minute.” I took a harsh tone. “You think there are moon men that have come in the past and probably stole the treasure?”

“No, I’m saying there is no treasure and never has been. Only stories made up. If there were treasure as they say in the abundance they say, I could have financed the entire Southern cause during the war!”

El Diablo was amused, but we had more pressing matters to attend to. “We have riders coming and we don’t know who they are and we have a long way to go yet to where we are going so I suggest we make camp for the night and get our bearings.”

El Diablo’s men would make camp where we were so they could be in open space and keep a watchful eye on the road behind in case the pursuers were looking for us. They would rotate guard duty and would be ready for anything.

“My balloon is in need of repair so would it be an imposition to join you this evening?”

“No amigo, not at all.”

“We’ll stay too,” I offered having gotten the ‘yes’ look of approval from Isadora and Jean-Paul. “We’ll be safer together and in the morning we can all head out together. I guess we’re all looking for the same thing. Skyships or treasure. If there is treasure as we suspect there will be, there should be  plenty for all of us. We have the map inside our head, El Diablo has the firepower to fend off any attack, and you Col. Beauregard have a skyship to make observations ahead and behind so we don’t get bushwhacked.”

Isadora nodded to confirm, giving in effect her permission o for the mission’s added new element….an eagle eye north west east and south. The elimination of surprise from any point on the compass. Our own skyship and alien visitor from the Confederate Planet!


We would go in shifts into town to eat and and relax, Isadora, Jean Paul, Gallegos, El Diablo and the sky pilot, Col. Beauregard and ten of the outlaw band would go first.
The outlaws to eat, drink, gamble and round up a seniorita for an hour while we would discuss our overall plans and formulate a timetable.

We made our way into Campeche and  the first cantina we came to we entered and ordered beans and rice, breads and cerveza. Isadora was already organized in her thoughts. “Tomorrow we should get rid of the pack mules except one to carry supplies. They are slowing us down and we are not fooling anyway anyway. We can use the money and get to our target faster.” We all agreed.

I asked Col. Beauregard about the group of men riding in our direction, now as night was falling they would be camped somewhere not far behind us. “What did the lead horse look like Col.? Could you see it’s coloring at all?”

“Of course I could. I have a pretty good telescope. During the war I could tell what kind of cigar your Gen. Grant was smoking. The lead horse was a chestnut. Magnificent horseflesh and large. The rider had a patch on one eye, no mistake about that.”

No there was no mistake about that. It was Monty Debauchery! Somehow he had gotten wind of our ruse and knew exactly what direction to find us. How, was a puzzle to me. Maybe sky ships were guiding him. Or he had figured it out from the start. Perhaps I had underestimated him.

“We better get your balloon fixed in a hurry Col. I think I know who it is. El Diablo, we need an early start. I know this man Monty and he is after the treasure too and is dangerous. We can get a good lead ahead and be ready for them. We’ll do the bushwhacking not Monty Debauchery!”

Gallegos jumped up and in an agitated voice said he will look for a buyer for the mules tonight to save time and disappeared into the night. The rest of us finished our meal and beer and headed back to the camp to help repair the balloon and get as much shut eye as we could. We wanted to make it to Merida up the road which would be our starting point to reach the pyramid of Chichen Itza where all indications pointed to X marks the spot.

When we made it back to camp, Isadora took me aside and by the flickering light of the campfire quietly brought out her father’s journal opening it to a page with drawings. He had been to Chichen Itza and other pyramids. His journal showed drawings of the types of sky ships and tall strange beings Beauregard described. Ancient gods? Sky travelers? Perhaps peyote delusions. The truth was beginning to blur. Skyships and treasure? Skyships or treasure? Or was it something we were better off not knowing about.
Time and reality would tell.

Chapter 15 - Dia de los Muertos

Dia de los Muertos
Baxter Dooley
Personal Journal Entry
Two days ago, we had left Campeche with everyone on horseback while three of us flew aloft in Col. Beauregards gas filled CSA balloon. We first had to make repairs to some small rips in the balloon fabric, Once we had completed that phase we fired up  his portable gas generation machine, adding to it from his supplies the correct concentration of sulfuric acid and iron filings so we could create enough hydrogen to soar above the landscape and dance with the eagles! God may not have given us wings to fly, but by playing god, we gave them to ourselves! It was marvelous. We could see the Yucatan laid out a’fore us. A quilted pattern of arid composition imbedded with the trappings of Toltec culture. The stories this land could tell if only it could speak!
Baxter Dooley
August 23, 1867
____________________________________________________________________________


Isadora, Jean-Paul & I traveled in the Col.’s balloon at his invitation while El Diablo led to rebel band on the dusty road to Merida. They brought along our saddled horses and the two remaining mules laden now, (in addition to some tools) bags of beans and foodstuff. Gallego’s had sold the excess pack mules to a livery stable owner who without much economic means did the best he could to make the transaction fair. We could have made more in Texas, but we weren’t in Texas, we were in Mexico now. Partial payment was in the form of a few bags of dried beans and rice, which it turns out we would be grateful later on as we made our way over the stark terrain from Merida to Chichen Itza and it’s pyramid of hidden treasure not to mention evidence of visitors from the sky in ancient times. We laughed at this idea, yet here we were aloft in a large 5 person basket with a Confederate sky pilot!


“Meet you in Merida,” I yelled to the men on the ground and we began our journey by looking behind our party to see if Monty and his mounted merry men were gaining ground on our party,  but had no sight of them. “Nothing in sight El Diablo, be safe. See you soon.” The rebels were amazed at the airborne display and waved sombrero’s at us with a chorus of “Adios!” to send us on our way towards Merida.


The journey was not long as the airborne balloon swallowed vast expanses of ground in  what seemed to be silent, motionless minutes. We set down a quarter mile outside of Merida to await  the rest of our party when they arrived. We would make camp here. The Col. told us to go ahead and scout the town while he and Jean-Paul took care of the balloon deflation and waited for the others to arrive at our rendezvous point.


Isadora looked radiant, glowing, excited and exciting. The journey aloft made us both feel so alive inside. As we walked the short distance to the town. She took my hand in hers and I felt fire in my heart. We didn’t say a word. We didn’t have to. Our touch spoke for us.
Once in town we found it gay with a fiesta.


Seems a festival of some sort was underway with the towns people wearing hideous make-up that would scare the meanest of hombres! “They look as though they’re skeletons come alive,” I mentioned to Isadora when suddenly a voice from behind interjected, “Exactly what they are, or at least are portraying monsieur.” Great, another damned Frenchie.


We both turned and Isadora began to engage in a conversation in French with this intruder of tender moments, then they both returned to English with Isadora laughing. “He admired our balloon Baxter. He could see us from here make our landing and wants to get a closer look at it before we leave.” I smiled at the stranger and held out my hand to be friendly. “I’m Baxter Dooley, sir, A pleasure to meet you.” He proffered his hand in greeting, “My name is Jules Verne. I’m traveling in Mexico to examine its colorful culture. I’m a writer you see and gathering material for some books I intend to write. I was thinking what a great adventure novel it would be. A trip in a balloon to faraway places! Mon Dieu!”


“Perhaps we can give you a ride before we leave Merida. We’re going inland from here.” I explained.


“I am too! I’m going to explore Mayan pyramids for a research paper I am working on for the Bibliotheche Nationale de France. I would be most grateful for transportation there if it is permissible.  I am willing to pay for the privilege.”


“I don’t think that will be a problem,” I offered without consulting the Colonel first. Isadora concurred. “He suis sûr que ce sera un honneur monsieur Verne.”


“How long have you been in Merida,” I queried.


“Two weeks now enjoying this marvelous festival. They call it Dia de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead. It goes on all month long. Wonderful fun! When the Spanish conquered the Aztecs they found them celebrating for the entire month of August or what it would be called on the Aztec Solar Calendar, but they have since moved it to November 1 to coincide with All Souls day, They felt it was too pagan so they forced them to change it in keeping with a Catholic Holiday. Now, the old guard in areas far removed from the Capital revert to the old ways and celebrate in August, as it should be!”


Isadora understood completely, while I remained amazed and somewhat uneasy, “Baxter, we celebrate death as well as life in New Orleans. I time of remembrance and joy.”


“Yes, but you also have a nasty habit of raising the dead. Very Mary Shelley if you ask me.”


Verne couldn’t resist and seemed genuinely surprised I was familiar with early 19th century literature. “I underestimated you Monsieur. You carry, how you say, a big iron on your hip yet are familiar with the literature of Mary Shelley and her novel ‘Frankenstein’ which is a wonderfully frightening story. I sir, am familiar with the culture of voodoo or v-o-u-d-o-o as it is properly spelled were one to write it down on linen. Here in Mexico it is different. No raising of the dead to walk the earth, merely a celebration to cheer the deceased spirits on their perpetual journey, These people have been celebrating this day for over 3,000 years. Imagine that! While we view death as the end of life, to these people , life was merely a dream and only in death did they become truly awake!”


“It was always a time for skulls as you see here. However the skulls are represented as masks today, in some places.” Gallegos appeared out of nowhere as if he were one of the grateful dead himself risen from the past. “It wasn’t always so. The ancients sometimes used the real skulls of their battle captives to offer to the Goddess of the Dead. It is a custom dying out. The peasants are a superstitious people and believe the  curse of the Aztecs is very real. It  says  if one goes after the treasure they have buried and hidden the thief will lose his head and become a resident of the underworld ruled by Mictlantecuhtli,  a god of the dead and the king of Mictlanthe  the  lowest section of the underworld.”


“Thank you, Gallegos for spooking us. Christ, what are you doing here so soon?”


“We rode fast and camp is being set up.  El Diablo and the others will be coming to town soon along with the Colonel.  After all, the dead are alive in spirit as you can see and now it is the time for the living to enjoy the fiesta too. After we leave here we go inland to Chichen Itza. Where we will travel in barren land. No fiestas. No cerveza.”


“What about Monty? Any sign of them?”


“No. They are taking their time now. I think they know exactly where we are headed. Anyone can figure it out by now. We must be on our guard even more than before.”


I had to agree. At that exact moment, dust was being raised on the road into town as El Diablo and some of his men rode in fast whooping and firing their pistols into the clouds above. Obviously they loved a good fiesta as well as I do. The Colonel was riding with them and looked strangely out of place astride a steed and not at the controls of his flying machine.


“El Diablo! Glad you made it,” I smiled.


“No trouble my friend. This Monty is far behind, but we will be ready for him should he show up. I left guards back at the camp. All good shots too. They have Winchesters so nothing will get past them. Now, we celebrate, yes?”


Isadora and I were ready to join in the festivities, but inside we wanted to find time to be alone. “Look, let’s get a room at the hotel over there, if there are any. We can spend the night here and when the group rides through in the morning we’ll have them bring our horses.”


She was more than agreeable. We announced our plans to everyone and before we headed to the hotel I made sure I introduced Jules to everyone, especially Col. Beauregard. “You two have a lot in common Colonel and if its OK, Jules can ride with you for a spell. Might give him an idea for a book or two. You might even be the hero in it!”


They both laughed and joining El Diablo and his men headed for the nearest cantina to wash the dust from their throats. Jean-Paul stared menacingly at me, then broke into a broad Haitian smile and winked. If he was a zombie, he was alright in my book.


Isadora and I found a room at the hotel. It was small but efficient. Even with so many people in town we managed to get one. “These people are poor, Baxter,” she said. “They can’t afford a room or barely food. They are also a strong people. I feel their strength. A proud people. Aztec and Mayan blood running through them as strong as a raging river.”


“You are an amazing woman, Isadora. Absolutely amazing.”


“It’s the spirits. They inform me. Quiet now. No more talk. Let’s get to our room and freshen up. Then we join the others. After that we will celebrate together. Alone.”


This woman could talk a rattlesnake into surrendering. Voodoo or no voodoo. I was powerless to resist. She had me lassoed and hogtied, and I was in no hurry to leave her rodeo!

Chapter 16 - Aztec Curse of the Grateful Dead

 

We caught up with the others just as the same golden sun Coronado must have been warmed by in his quest for Cibola was descending now below the western horizon of what once was thought to be an Earth as flat as a tortilla. Who knows how many had journeyed to far in the past to the edge of a this invisible precipise only to find more and more terra firma firmly in place.


The town square was alive with dancers, drums and dia los muertos masks.
“It’s all so wonderful. Death as a life celebration, Baxter,” Isadora remarked.


“Yep. Different from anything I’ve seen. Let find a drink and some food. I’m starving!”
Was my somewhat cavalier retort. She saw beauty. I saw a table with wine jugs and gourds filled with mescal the agave drink to cure all ills. As they say in the villages "Para todo mal, mezcal, y para todo bien, también." or "For every ill, Mezcal, and for every good as well." I’ll drink to that!


Mescal gourds in hand we found our new friend Jules Verne and Jean-Paul sitting on the ground with Col. Beauregard and El Diablo. Gourds raised high in a heathen toast to some hellish deity long forgotten or perhaps just created as an excuse as an  exercise in excess. The semi-circle they had formed was draped in a blue haze that wafted and danced in the fading light.


Isadora howled playfully in her raspy voice, smiling a coyote smile and licking her lips.
“Come Baxter. Let’s dance with the gods!”


We joined our treasure hunting compadres and it was then my epiphany of momentary enlightenment struck. When Isadora said ‘dance with the gods’ I had no idea she meant it was with sticks of marijuana Jean-Paul and Gallegos had wangled from some local Indians. He was wearing that big happy Haitian smile of his passing the stick to Diablo. Jules was chewing like a madman on peyote and washing the mescaline down with a pinata sized gourd of mescal. No wonder he wrote later of fantastic journeys and forays into science fiction.  “I am Captain Nemo!” he said by way of mock introduction to us as we joined the disjointed circle of drug induced individuals risen from the hallucinogenic flames of Dante’s Inferno.


Seconds became timeless as minutes seemed as desert sands in a slow flowing hourglass grain by grain crashing to the bottom of the glass with the impact of moons crashing into unseen and as yet unknown planets. Dancers swirled about us coaxing us to join in their reverie, which we did. It was truly a celebration, the likes of which I had never experienced.


The fiesta was winding down near midnight, as were we, so Isadora and I bid the group goodnight and headed to our room where the lingering effects of the drugs were not wasted on us. We were two coyotes in heat and when a coyote, do what comes naturally to him and Senorita Coyote. Mount and mate! When  we had both expended ourselves, orgasm achieved...we both let out a coyote howl that reverberated from the walls of the surrounding mountains. Our howl was returned to us from those same mountains obviously from a coyote chorus of a dozen or so wild ones representing Aztec spirits acknowledging our sexual indulgence and congradulating we mere mortal humans.  


“Isadora! You are phenomenal!” I blurted out.


“You can drop your gun belt anytime you want cowboy, oh and your pants too!” she responded. We lay in sweat and silence and drowning delightfully in the musk of sex we had created and fell asleep deeper than we ever had before. When we awoke at dawn we were faced with a frantic knock on our room’s door. It was one of El Diablos men.


“Pardon me, senor and senorita, there is something you must see back at camp. We walked the short distance back to camp which was already awake. Coffee was brewing, I need a cup badly. We walked over to the circle the others had formed and parted when we reached them.


On the ground before us was the lifeless body of Gallegos. Not just lifeless...but headless as well! It was right out of a Washington Irving book. Sleepy Hollow was now Merida, Mexico and Gallegos was sprawled out as the Headless Horseman in the dirt!


“What happened,?” I cried out. El Diablo merely shook his head. “I’m not sure but he was drunk and spoke to some villagers about Aztec and Mayan gold and treasure. I think maybe he talk too much. Legend say the Gods protect the treasure and if any man seeks it they will die.”


“Don’t tell me,” I said. “By losing their head?”


“Si, Senor Dooley. By losing their head.”  


I’m not one to believe in such rubbish but Isadora concurred. “Same in voodoo Baxter. May spirits, many curses in the world unknown. If he were killed in town and robbed he would still have a head, but no money. No one else here had reason to kill him and the fact that no one heard anything says something.”


“OK, for now. But I still don’t buy into all that...yet...but the question remains...where the hell is his head?”


The answer was forthcoming from the Colonel and Jules who were getting the balloon ready for the days journey. “I found it. Here in the basket,” the Colonel said as he held it up displaying it with a look of shock forever emblazoned on its bodiless face.


“Get rid of it please,” I implored.


“No, I want it. I can use it in my offering ceremony as a charm. A token of good luck and fortune.” Leave it to Jean-Paul to collect and be grateful for dead heads. It was tossed to him and was placed on his saddle horn and would ride with us in that manner for the rest of the journey drying out with skin shrinking gradually until only the skull would remain as a token charm of good luck….or a warning of supernatural forces we would have to encounter in our quest for treasure.  


We were wary, all of us...except for Jules Verne. “This will be a fantastic voyage gentlemen..and dear Isadora. What adventure!”


I could have shot him on the spot...Isadora said only, “Death is a release from this world and entry into a paradise!”


So based on that I was one of the suffering life forms...while lucky Gallegos was one of the grateful dead!

Chapter 17 - Mayan Gods and Space Aliens

 

The Colonels billowing balloon, which we had christened ‘The Aztec Voyager’ after a night of pagan pinatas, peyote and portentous participation in the village fiesta, was made ready for flight. It’s magnificent bag filling with the noxious mixture prepared by the Colonel with the determined acuity of an ancient alchemist. We were voyagers in the sky, much as Aztec and Mayan mythology had described and been inscribed in granite on walls as pre-Columbian petroglyphs and hieroglyphs told tales of visitors from space, gods descending from the blue heavens.

 

We were now one man short in our company as Gallegos had gone and offended Spanish and Native ghosts and gods. Jean-Paul kept Gallegos’ severed head as a souvenir of the degenerate decapitation. Haitian tastes in voodoo decor was beyond my comprehension but, one man’s severed head is another man’s magic charm against unthinkable beasts from the Underworld we know nothing about.

 

Isadora and I would sail the currents with the Colonel and Jules. The basket had plenty of room and we would be able to scout ahead with an eagle eye view of the land for any Federales lying in wait ahead of us, or the legions of Monty Debauchery behind us.

 

“El Diablo, give me a hand with this crate. I want this in the balloon...may come in handy in the next few days,” I asked with a grin.

 

“What are we hiding Senor Baxter? Something of value to be shared with the rest of us. We are partners, yes?”

 

“Si. I mean yes. This is just a box of insurance amigo.”

I pried the lid open and exposed its explosive content for all to see. “It’s dynamite. I planned ahead in case we ran into groups of bandits, well, such as yourselves or Monty’s men.”

 

“We are revolutionaries, Senor. We were banditos, but only out of necessity, Now we fight with a purpose.”

 

“Well then,” I replied, “What kind of revolutionary band would go into battle without the upper hand?”

 

El Diablo launched that grin of his forever chomping on a perpetual cigar that I think he emerged from the womb with. “So, if we have trouble down here…” I couldn’t resist finishing his thought, “We attack it from up there. Boom!”

 

The Colonel was ecstatic and gave out a good old southern rebel yell. “Aerial bombardment! Gads! This will be fun!”

 

We loaded the explosive cargo aboard the basket. Isadora and I then followed suit climbing aboard with help from Jean-Paul on the ground and Jules Verne aboard the craft.

He was scribbling quickly in his small vest pocket notebook, no doubt keeping notes for use in a story in the future about balloons soaring aloft fighting off an enemy on the ground below in pitched battle or perhaps merely a footnote regarding a headless Mexican guide who angered some invisible gods who only emerge while under the influence of peyote as spectral hallucinations yet come complete with cold, hard very real razor sharp steel to punish the non-penitent.

The horses were saddled, men were mounted, basket crew ready to be untethered and launched. As we began our ascent I couldn’t help taking one last look of the morning at Jean-Paul’s adorned saddlehorn. I swore the head of Gallegos was smiling at us. Grinning, knowingly, with his free from flesh spirit floating along the River Styx while his head was going in the other direction to Chichen Itza and hidden Aztec treasure. Hopefully he wouldn’t upset the gods anymore sparing us our heads. Now about those visitors from space we might encounter.

Chapter 18 - Balloon Battle of the Yucatan

 

 

Along with the dynamite, we were also armed with Navy Colts and two Henry rifles ready to unleash a rain of lead from above on any adversary we might come across on this, the most dangerous stretch of our foray in a foreign land infamously known for quick death for interlopers at the hands of gunslinging vengeful vaquero’s or imprisonment and torture by the ruling French army who ran Mexico with Napoleonic iron fist. Treasure hunters, let alone gringos were fair targets for European bullets.

 

We felt safe aloft in the Colonel’s balloon with El Diablo’s contingent of wild men running interference on terra firma should it come to that. We were heading inland away from the cool gulf waters alive with marine life venturing into a land of rattlesnakes and curses!

 

Isadora was radiant as the early morning sun bathed her in it’s golden rays. She was the treasure I really craved. She cast a net over me and I was captivated. Better to be captivated than Gallegos who had been decapitated!

 

A few mile out of Merida we noticed a great column of dust rising ahead of us by a few miles. More troubling was a black speck floating in mid-air heading in our direction. “What is it Baxter?” Isadora queried cautiously. “I’m not sure, but I don’t like it!”

 

The Colonel already had his brass spyglass extended and he spoke in a tone that set the hairs on my neck to stand at attention. “It’s a damned balloon!! Flying the flag of France...and she’s heading our way along with French troops on horseback with lances and rifles.”

 

I immediately leaned over the basket rim to yell a warning to el Diablo. “Frenchies ahead! On horseback and one damned balloon!!!” I got the signal ...Message Received.

Isadora squeezed my arm tightly. I was already tightly wound as a German pocket watch,

“Well, Colonel. What now?”

 

He let out that blood curdling rebel yell he must have used a thousand times during the war, “We attack sonny. We attack!”

 

The French had balloons? I was naive. Jules Verne filled us in. “Monsieur. We invented ballooning! Pleasure flights by adventures at first but once developed. Napoleon used them in 1859 to defeat Austria.”

 

Not only were going to engage what could quite possibly the first air battle in history, but the French had the upper hand and edge of experience!  I had to think fast and furious. If this was to be war then I had to think like Tecumseh Sherman and not a mere gunman-writer. Dynamite and Balloons!

 

We quickly made sure our Colts and Henry’s had full chambers. Then an idea blasted through my head. “Colonel. How close can we get to their balloon?”

 

“I can touch basket to basket, but be aware my young Yankee friend. They will try to place a few rounds in our canvas to force us to land.”

 

“Do it,” I said with my best commander in chief voice, then hollered down to El Diablo. “Their balloon will reach you before the ground troops by the looks of things. Keep them busy up there. Keep a steady stream of lead flying. I have a plan!”

 

“And just what is the plan, Baxter?” Isadora fairly pleaded and I could sense the fear in her voice. “Hand me some dynamite!” I yelled as we closed in on the balloon, French ground troops not far behind. El Diablo, was no stranger to warfare as he divided his forces with half of them racing ahead to deliver the first blows to the ground troops while the remainder dashed just ahead of us to begin the balloon assault.

 

As we neared combat readiness, Jules was writing in his journal as fast as a Gatling gun at Gettysburg! The Colonel was getting us as close as we could. So close we could see their faces. Bullets from below kept them busy firing back in the hopes of avoiding being downed by a well aimed bullet.

 

They probably thought we were going to try to board them as we were so close! We weren’t pirates on the high seas trying to capture a frigate, but we were high in the sky trying to bump their balloon so we would be as close to them as a baby in a womb.

 

The Colonel got the balloon rim to rim…”Get ready to back off Colonel” I yelled as I let the fuse on three sticks and dynamite and tossed them into the French balloon basket. Panic ensued, firing from the French ceased as they scrambled, bumping heads to get the explosives tossed out. Confined quarters, fear and panic did the rest.

 

Our balloon broke away fast and were a safe distance away when the explosion ripped the basket apart ejecting its cargo of French soldiers and guns to the death awaiting them on the rocks below. We could feel the heat of the blast. On the ground El Diablo’s rebels stopped in amazement and awe as the cascade of humanity soared to the ground below, the basket non-existent with the tattered balloon now billowing lifeless in the sky floating along on a current taking it towards the sea.

 

While the French ground troops looked up in amazement were now dazed and momentarily off guard as El Diablo’s men attacked with a fury. The French waving sabers as good officers will do in such events. Sabers are no match for guns. Ceremonial parades yes, ground battle with gun toting degenerates? No!

 

To add to the blood flow we were now free from any French ground fire which allowed us to float menacingly over the croissant cadre in soon to be blood soaked uniforms followed by becoming a meal for vultures and coyotes in a strange land far away from the vineyards of Bordeaux.

 

Isadora and I lit more dynamite while the Colonel fired his Henry. Once we were directly over the center of the mass of men we dropped stick after stick of dynamite which ripped through the troops as sure as William T. Sherman burning Atlanta to the ground.

 

The French had been Waterloo’d once again.

 

We surveyed to battlefield below...El Diablo’s men were looting the bodies of weapons, ammunition, gold watches, jackets and new boots. To the victors go the spoils and in this case...there were no prisoners.

 

We had engaged in aerial warfare and I have to admit it was the catalyst for the night to come with Isadora. Her adrenaline level was peaking in perfect harmony with mine. We all were in a mental state I could never have fathomed before. Isadora’s passions had been ignited as were mine...and the fuse was short. Tonight they would detonate in a sexual explosive that would leave us both drained...if sex were war….I’m all for it. Afterall ….to the victor go the spoils!

Chapter 19 = Mayans Lost in Space

 

The heavily forested region of the ruins of Chichen Itza unfolded below the silent flight of our ethereal sky machine revealing a rocky road system radiating as explosive  spokes on a westward ho wagon wheel from the center of the former Mayan city which occupied nearly five square kilometres including  El Castillo pyramid … the centerpiece of the village of legend and lore as well as the current object of our enterprise aboard our airship newly christened as ‘The Enterprise’ by that writing rascal and adventurous traveling companion Jules Verne. A journey  that began in New Orleans with half of a treasure map to locate Toltec  treasure  that may or may not exist.


Were these merely  tale tales fueled by  speculative superstitious minds fixated on plunder and conquest then elevated to mythic proportions planted as seeds in a garden by overzealous Spanish soldiers and Catholic missionaries with a ‘pagan’  empire to conquer with an  expansive  agenda to convert the indigenous peoples to servile Christian slavery while eradicating the native culture, replacing ceremonial sacrifice with a canon of crucifixion fixation.  


Pre-Columbian Mayan culture ruled an area that developed expansive and aggressive trade routes from the Incan Empire of  South America and northward to the pueblos of the North American Southwest and the tribes of Canada.


We would be descending soon landing in the ruins near El Castillo where the treasure was rumored  to be hidden inside and underground perhaps deep inside the earth. Jules was ecstatic at the prospect. “Gads, imagine, a journey to the center of the earth! It is just beyond comprehension. I must make a note of this!” He made notes constantly for future reference of course.


Treasure clouded our minds. We could come up empty and all would be for naught as we would find out whether we were victims of  Isadora’s father’s old man fanciful folly or on the bright side of the coin our dreams would be a rich reality. We heard only silence as we glided over the vast site, long abandoned, with only the sound of El Diablo’s men on horseback riding below to meet us to make camp before we set about the task of treasure hunting.


Luckily there was still no sign of Monty Debauchery’s men or Maximillian’s French occupation soldiers to impede our prodigious progress.  Then without warning crashing through the silence of winged flight, Jules Verne shouted out as though an epiphany had suffered a cerebral orgasm filling an ancient mandala with a new reality.


“Look! Look over there in the clearing!”


Clearly seen on a flat rocky surface were strange circular symbols visible now to the naked eye but only from above at great heights as we were. Amazingly they were perfect circles carved into  the surface of solid stone. One couldn’t help but wonder how they got there in the first place, and why they appeared to make some sort of sense from above yet unnoticed, near invisible to the mind’s eye. Balloon technology didn’t exist for Mayans to take flight to direct to the terra firma artists below on the placement of these peculiar land carvings  when the Maya culture was at it’s apex nor did they have the tools for such  massive undertaking to dig the circles so deep and so precise in pre-arranged arrangement into sheer rock!


“What do you think Verne, little green men from Mars having a little fun with we earthlings?” I half heartedly remarked.


“Funny you should mention that,” Jules replied.  “As a student of science and futurism I have to laugh at the idea of Martians visiting from some cattle drive in space roaming amongst us and ordering a beer in a saloon along with a Saturday night bath and shave before retiring upstairs with a dance hall girl in a frilly dress.. No sir, if these were made from people who dropped out of the sky, most likely they were from Venus!”


Of course. That made more sense! About as much sense as a one legged man in an ass kicking contest or giving a book to dog!


“Venus! That’s a good one. Venus!” I said incredulously.


Isadora squeezed my arm gently, I could hear a subdued laugh as she whispered in my ear. “Don’t be too harsh on him Baxter. He may be possessed or crazy. His head may start spinning around and light up!” She was right. You never know when or what a French gringo crazed on Mexican heat and marijuana will do at any given moment. The prospect was interesting though I have to admit. “Colonel, what do you think about space travel?” Isadora asked with a subtle tone of sarcasm masked very well I might add.   


“Don’t rightly know Ma’am. If there is such a thing, we could have used their help at Gettysburg and Atlanta. General Lee aboard such a craft would have had Grant on the run all the way to Washington with his Yankee tail between his legs. Now that would be something to see...ha….we would’a won the whole cotton pickin’ war with a little help from Venus or Mars!”


Jules could feel the jocular jesting as a jousting match he had to counter.  “Well ma’am, I’ve done considerable study on the Mayans before I set out on my travels. My curiosity had me chained to a chair in libraries from Boston to Mexico City and I can come to only one conclusion. Venusians.” He said this with all the confidence of a gunslinger who has the wiles, calm and inner conviction of a poker faced liar to explain how he killed 12 men with only one bullet while  standing on his head blindfolded in a watering hole in Wichita


“Look, El Castillo, where dear Isadora’s father says from beyond the grave our treasure is hidden was built as a dedication  to the Mayan god, Kukulkan of the Feathered Serpent deity closely related to the Aztec god Quetzalcoatl


To them it was known as the Temple of Kukulcan. Just north of the Temple there is a curious platform dedicated to the planet Venus. It also served as an observatory with doors and windows aligned to astronomical events, specifically around the path of Venus as it traveled the heavens.“


Isadora it seems was also versed in some aspects of the culture. “He has a point! I remember reading that the Maya seem to have been more fascinated by them than any other civilization in human history. There has always been a number of people who believe aliens had contact and exchanged knowledge with ancient humans, particularly the Mayans.  Many believe  people from another galaxy have made contact and the Mayan priests who may have received ancient wisdom from these space travelers.”


My Gawd, I thought. The three of them were loco! “Space travelers! Next you’ll be telling me there were time travelers from the future as well who dropped by for a bottle of whiskey before they saddled up for Abilene or the moon!”


The Colonel had a plug nickel to add. “The Mayans were interested in both time and space travel now that I think about it.  Do I believe that there were spaceships flying around with beings who interacted with them on earth? I don’t know...but 200 years ago man was earthbound, couldn’t fly... and the world was flat..now look..the earth is round and we’re high in the sky...so anything is possible son.”


The balloon landed with a bump or two as it always did.
“Look Isadora, If any Mayans were around they would hail us a visiting gods from the far reaches of space no doubt and a great feast would be laid out before us before the big kick finish...the sacrifice of a virgin to Kukulkan with a cacophony of pagan drums and dancing followed by an orgy of sex and drugs with a group of two headed Venusian women!”


She looked at me with those large brown eyes of hers that could melt my heart in a heartbeat. “Yum,” she smiled. “Now THAT would be fun!” Somehow I was not surprised..in fact…I was delighted at the fantasy she projected to my libido!

Chapter 20 - Ancient Ones & Mayan Midgets

 

Date: August 23, 1867

The ‘Enterprise’ landed with a terra firma thump, thump. thump bouncing along the brown Tolec dirt coming to an abrupt heart pounding stop surrounded in a  cloud of dust with  all aboard unscathed as the basket settled on end as the balloon deflated floating angelic gently to the ground.


Not far behind us El Diablo and his merry mercenary bandit men, aka revolutionaries when the situation warrants, were approaching our meeting place at a hell of a gallop. We had mentally made Chichen Itza our own private Cibola. Pyramids, altars, strange alien hieroglyphics on walls and on the ground, the latter only visible from the air. Most of all we hungrily anticipated it as the repository of untold riches and wealth, at least  according to the map Isadora had and her father’s stories. I hoped he wasn’t a spinner of yarns as I created in my pulp novels and articles for Harper’s Weekly about lawdogs and outlaws of what was fast becoming the ‘old’ west’ as modernization and mechanization raced iron horse forward at a furious American industrial pace.


As we got our land legs steady on the ground we were approached by a contingent of...well, hard to explain, but will try… a contingent of large headed midgets with strange weapons in hand. The weapons were  guns of a type I never saw before. These were not Sam Colt’s Colts. (But he’d pay a fortune for information on them!)


I leaned closer to isadora’s ear inhaling her tri-racial musk  and said softly, “ I don’t believe this...Mayan Midgets?” Of course her laugh was enough to trigger a laugh response in me as well. El Diablo, since dismounted came over to our group with a grin broader than the entire Gulf of Mexico when he saw them up close.


Jules Verne as always was one literate step ahead of us walking brazenly up to the vertically challenged greeting committee.   “ Bah-sch kah wah-lee” to which the supposed leader replied “Meesh bah, koosh tehch?Bix a k’ aaba” My gawd, Mayan lingo


“I am Jules Verne, these are my friends. Do you speak English or only Mayan?”


“I am Balam and these are my friends. We speak many languages. We are related to the ancient ones and are the protectors of Chichen Itza. What is your business here?”


El Diablo with the social grace of  a desert buzzard not sharing a dead coyote carcass blurted  out words faster than beer flowing from  a broken beer keg spigot, “We’re looking for the treasure, little man. The hidden treasure of the Toltecs. My men and I are revolutionaries and we need it to finance our revolt to free our people from tyranny.” So much for subtlety! I firmly believe he would pick the pocket of a condemned man who  was swinging from the gallows in a dusty town square with an audience of bible belters belting out that old tyme thou shalt not kill religion, unless sanction by the law west of the Pecos.






“Ah, the treasure. Many have come before, senors y senorita. The treasure has never been found. Only stories of this place I am afraid. Maybe there is no treasure and you have wasted a journey.”


“Not likely,”I said offering the map as some sort of abstract proof. Balam’s stance changed quickly. “Where did you get this?” he screamed excitedly. Isadora fessed up it was her father’s map. Balam bowed graciously to us. What the hell was going on?


“Please, join us... as friends. I will explain. Let me show you something that may be of interest. He and his compact compadres led us to the base of the central pyramid. He stepped aside pointing to faded 700 year old carvings in the stone that foretold a story that would unfold 700 years later.. in fact, roughly in  this decade of the 1860’s. We  stood with our mouths open in disbelief as beef cattle must look after an arduous journey across the plains to the Kansas City stockyards only to be transported to Chicago to begin the killing process that would have them end up as steaks on a plate in the finest restaurants in St. Louis. “Don’t forget the steak sauce and baked potato garcon’ and bring me the wine list , merci’”




“You can see now,” Balam said proudly, “Why you are most welcome here as our honored guests. Anything you wish, including the treasure is yours!” We didn’t quite fathom what was being said. Soon after careful scrutiny it hit us with the impact of an ambush bullet in the back. The carvings depicted an air machine which strangely enough was a disc like balloon shape with a gondola compartment for passengers secured below. In the gondola  was a woman, a dark haired beauty with a beam of light emanating from her eyes pointing to the pyramid!


“Isadora. That’s you!” I said incredulously. It was uncanny! The resemblance was remarkable!


“Yes, and the light from the eyes is the same marking  found  at the base of your map,” Balam brought to our attention.”


“Damn, he’s right. I never noticed it before thinking it was just some superstitious mumbo jumbo,” I had to admit.


Isadora was in a state of shock. “I don’t understand. How….I mean..what…?”


Balam smiled and took the map from her hand.


“As I mentioned before, we are the offspring of the ancient ones from the sky. They showed our people the way to progress...building these magnificent structures, how to extract valuable metals from the earth, yes, gold, silver, jewels which we fashioned into ornamentals. We developed rapidly, but could see the outside world was fast encroaching. The visitors had sexual relations with our people….we are the result...the offspring of generation after generation.”


“That doesn’t explain the carvings...or the map,” Jules interceded.


“The Ancient Ones foretold of a sky machine coming in the future. Destiny guided your ship to this location. 20 Years ago a man ventured into Chichen Itza. A foreign man, French I believe who had come here quite by accident. We befriended him and told him our story and about the treasure, but did not show him it. We came across another carving, the one you just saw. Another carving, smaller, here at the bottom almost unnoticeable is one of the stranger and a young girl...with light coming  from her eyes...he had a dark haired daughter, you Senorita. So from past instructions we were to give the map to the stranger, your father I assume. You were chosen by the Ancients...it is yours because your heart is pure..and peaceful… Destiny proclaimed 700 years ago has  now been fulfilled!”


We were all in a state of disbelief and ecstasy at the same time. “Queen Isadora,” I said to her jokingly as we took our seats at a sundown feast with our hosts. “I tip my sombrero to you your majesty!” Which garnered me a soft punch to my arm by the woman with light emanating from her eyes..and her heart.


“I knew there was a reason I could love you,” I said jokingly.


“Ah Mr. Dooley, you only love me for my pyramids!”


We were all in a jovial mood, the food served was plentiful and the company enjoyable. As it got darker and darker we heard, then saw thousands of giant Mexican fruit bats emerge from the pyramid in near military precision. Jules was now writing furiously in his leather bound notebook.


“What’s the hurry, Jules? You write as though you’re going to die from snakebite.”


“Before I set out for Mexico I was in New York. Having just sailed from France.  I made friends with a real estate man, a Mr. Benjamin Baum who had a perfectly charming young son, Frank is his name. I was a guest in their home for a week and the lad loved stories. Knowing I was a writer he said he wanted to be one too when he grew up.,. A writer of children’s stories. So I am merely making notes so he can fashion a story from them someday. How marvelous...the bats for example to us as adults are just bats..but you see, to  child they could be anything, flying monkeys for example. A magical village inhabited by a race of little people. Flying Monkeys. A child can picture these things and create a story. A little girl leads them on a journey of magic. Isadora for example is the protaganist. She meets three friends who are all searching for treasure. You, Mr. Dooley, El Diablo and myself. Her three friends. Marvelous idea don’t you think? Ah and you Colonel are the key to the treasure. You are who they seek! It’s grand but only child can write it! Or someone with great imagination. Young Frank Baum is just the writer.!”


“It will never sell,” I added my pulp fiction detective novel two cents. “Flying monkeys and little people and a young girl leading a journey. Even if you added an evil witch I don’t think the world is ready for this drivel! What are you writing down now Jules?”


“Fantastic. An evil witch! Thanks Mr.Dooley. Perfect. I can’t wait to send this off to him! He’ll be excited!”


“Yes, then when he grows up he’ll see how ludicrous the concept is and end up leaving the literary canyons of Chicago and go back home to the family farm. After all..there’s no place like home.”

Chapter 21 - Sacrificial Virgins

 

 

Balam, if not of normal stature was a  giant among men,  and was the perfect host, if alien offspring with a history of sacrificing virgins doesn’t bother you. No wonder the Golden Age of the Maya disappeared. I can think of a few other things to do with a virgin other than strapping them down on a rock slab from the Cenote Sagrado near the main pyramid and removing a beating heart.

We sat down in the enveloping darkness and were partaking of a passing gourd cup of xtabenton, a Mayan ceremonial drink made from a species of morning glory seeds that contain ergine, which has I must admit some wonderful hallucinogenic properties which worked wonders faster than bullets fired from a Gatling Gun. It induces visions and a somewhat trance like state where prophecy is preponderant.

Soon, as the effects grab a hold, we were catatonic cowboys watching cosmic wheels on  a Conestoga wagon race along the ruts with hostiles in hot pursuit. The effects were energizing. Isadora moved in closer to me to get warm, or affectionate. I wasn’t quite sure, but  felt it was a little of both. Her hair brushed my face and right then and there I wanted to sacrifice both of us sexually on an altar of mutual agreement.

 

Just as the intoxication was at it’s peak, all of us were silent as we were cast into our own inner worlds, especially Jean-Paul who was speaking in a fashionable patois to the severed head of Gallegos who it appeared was listening  intently to every word!

The silent circle was not to be unbroken. “El Castillo is where the treasure is located,” Balam explained startling all of us with its abruptness causing El Diablo to draw his pistol to take on any and all interlopers. Never give vision inducing drugs to a paranoid bandito with a loaded gun! Lesson learned….

 

The little man continued. “Along with some gold, jade and silver you will also find an excellent collection of human remains. Bones and skulls of those who were given an afterlife with Kukulkan, the Feathered Serpent.”

 

I had trouble picturing a serpent with feathers, but then again, my host was part Venusian and part Mayan, so anything is possible. Even harder for me was to erase the mental pictures of a multitude of Mayan virgins being wasted on some invisible deity on a slab of cold stone.

 

“The treasure you seek is inside in an underground chamber on the shore of the great underground river, yet the real treasure lies elsewhere, the treasure of your dreams that lie in your heart.”

Balam was as balmy or if he were an Irish leprechaun I’d say he was full of blarney.

 

El Diablo was not in the mood nor in rapt attention of any mystical horseshit handed out by our host. “Senor, I can’t help but notice. There is no entrance to El Castillo. How does one go inside to retrieve this maybe treasure or maybe not treasure?”

 

Isadora, ever surprising, had the inebriated answer. “The entrance lies in a riddle my father told me about before he died. Notice there are four sides of the pyramid with 91 steps to the top on each side, which in total equals 364 steps, equal to one year on the Haab Calendar of the old ones.”

 

“So….that means what?” I asked with a puzzled look on my face.

“It means my dear Baxter, the riddle is the key. “The treasure is guarded, by the sacrificed virgins, now afterlife warriors, female warriors, I might add. Mean as rattlesnakes. The key to the treasure is to get past them after you enter through the entrance from  step 365.”

 

Balam was impressed. “The beautiful senorita is correct. Once you gain entry you must then go underground to the correct chamber. There are signs carved to mislead you, into death I might add, you could be lost forever until life leaves your body. So remember this...the treasure lies within... in the underground chambers….the other in your hearts. One is life, the other could mean death and no treasure. You must choose.”

 

Jules was game and nodded to affirm the physical journey. The Colonel was even more eager “Forward I say chaps! To glory and fame!”

 

As for El Diablo. “We only live once. I say we go inside.” Succinct certainly.

 

“Isadora?”

 

“My father taught me ...Fear Nothing….Use the power within..I say yes, oui, si.”

 

“I guess it’s unanamous. Besides, any evil spirits down there can be dealt with by Isadora’s own powers.”

 

“Don’t count on it Baxter. I think the Mayan Mojo is more powerful. Feathered Serpents and an army of warlike virgins may be more than even I and Jean-Paul can handle.”

 

Even with his good luck charm of Gallego’s head and himself a member of the Voodoo undead I had to doubt our chances against any macabre Mayan myths that may attempt to impede our quest. “Do we all agree?” I asked in a whistling in a New Orleans graveyard voice.

We retired to our individual shelters to rest up for the dawns daring exploration. Isadora and I to make love to a background of Mayan flute music that seemed incessant yet hypnotic. Voodoo vagina under a Mayan moon with the planet Venus smiling down upon us.

I told Isadora finally, “I love you!” To which she replied, “Shut up, Baxter. Lie down and take it like a cowboy. Be ready...because I ain’t no virgin!”

 

After going deep into Isadora’s private chamber of sexual wonders, we fell deep into a sleep in each other’s arms drenched in love, sex and sweat. Sleep was welcomed. We would be going deep underground with underground rivers and chambers of gold not to mention Virgins from Hell. Jules Verne was jubilant. “Monsieur Dooley. Great adventure. It will be as if we are going on a journey to the center of the earth!” I had the feeling this trip was placing his literary genius on overload.

 

It was unanimous. Tomorrow at dawn we would enter the Serpent’s lair, and would have to solve the riddle to gain access to El Castillo and the treasure we hoped would be there. It was prophesy after all. You don’t fuck with aliens from space or mess with a Mayan midget with the attitude of a Billy the Kid from another galaxy.

Chapter 22 - Broken Code of Jaguars and Aliens

 

Sunrise crept slowly upward that morning to hover over the land of the jaguar and spaceships. My mind had wrestled through the all dark  coyote howling puma growling night. Step 365 still a mystery to be confronted and conquered.

My eyes became acclimated to the grey morning and as I gazed next to me  Isadora became  a vision of  sexuality….a sleek Quadroon  panther wrapped in soft mist as she lay still sleeping on the reed mats we were given as our bedroll for the night. Sex on reed mats with hypnotic flute   music cascading earthward to beat of drums of animal skin from above the great pyramid is a pleasant enough experience. The fact that that we were also full of hallucinatory drink and smoke increased the pleasure levels to a point that would make the nearest proprietor of a Chinese opium den close up shop in embarrassed dishonor!

I nudged her gently, kissed her even more gently and walked softly outside to  freshen up in one of the pools of water outside, which I found out later were ceremonial ‘cenotes’ or pools. The one I chose of course was the Sacred Well of Sacrifice. At any moment I might have a stone dagger thrust into my heart, but on second thinking I realized something important. I am not a virgin! So I would not be a worthy candidate as a sacrifice to satisfy even the lowliest perverse gods of the underground underworld of Mayan mythology. Sex can be a lifesaver if you ever find yourself on a stone slab facing a peyote priest with a ceremonial scimitar!

 

“Senor Dooley, up here!” It was the voice of El Diablo calling to me from the top of El Castillo. The sun rising behind him gave him an eerie aura of yellow gold from its ascent as he ascended the steps on the eastern side of the pyramid. “I found it!” he exclaimed excitedly. “Step 365! It’s here!” The Serpent’s must have guided him!

 

El Diablo had spent the night searching the pyramid steps for the elusive and what we felt was the non-existent ‘step 365’ considering there were only 364 of them placed by the architects of antiquity. Those madcap Mayans do like puzzles and riddles! Damn them and their spaceship amigos

I made the arduous climb to the top where El Diablo was standing on a stone step that was a stand alone flat step with carved symbols facing the east. The symbols were a series of dots, bars and what looked like shells. “What are you talking about? It’s just a slab of stone.

 

El Diablo was quick to explain. “In the Mayan numeral system they used but three symbols in different configurations. Dots are one, bars are five, and the symbol of the shell is zero. I won’t explain the long form of how they arrived at this...but  this is the only step that stands alone for no reason. Three dots over two zeros signifies 300. There are  single bars under the shells that add up to 65.  This is supposed to be because this is roughly the number of days in a solar year.  The Maya had a quite accurate calculation of 365 days for the solar year.  In effect we  have found step 365.”

I was amazed. It was as thrilling to have discovered the answer to the puzzle as it was  to watch a magician saw a dance hall girl in half in Abeline I witnessed once. He put her back together fortunately, but I would have given 50 head of Texas longhorns for her bottom half alone!

 

“How did you do this? Amazing El Diablo, absolutely amazing.”

“I am not just a horse bum on the run as you say in your country. I was a professor at the university for many years. Mexican and Native History until Maximillan had many of us removed for our ‘liberal’ views about such things as independence and freedom. The usual complaint of tyrants.”

He was remarkable. An educated academic as handy with mathematics as he was with a Colt.

“Now I am but a mere revolutionary on the run. Many of my men are former students and rebellious riff raff who will fight for any cause if there is profit in it. In these times we take what we can get. By the way, my name is Sandoz Diego Cerveza. Call me Diego.”

 

“Pleased to meet you Diego. Any man named Cerveza is alright in my book.”

I practically flew down the step waking the camp. “We found it. The missing step! No we can begin the search!”

 

The camp was rousted by my cacophony of sheer excitement. As I reached the shelter Isadora and I shared she was not there. Jean-Paul came up behind me. “She is in back of those rocks. Balam was kind enough to show her the pool where the virgins were purified prior to, well, you know. She has privacy with all these men around. He felt it was best.”

 

“Yes, yes it is Jean-Paul. Thank you or merci or whatever you say.”

I ran hard behind the rocks and there was Isadora standing half emerged in the purification pool. Water dripping from her firm round multiracial brown breasts gently bouncing as she soaped herself, her hair wet and dripping while the small patch of hair between her legs glistened  invitingly. I had spent the night firmly held inside that hidden place and found my treasure already in her animal sexuality. The Mayans missed to boat standing on ceremony!

“Come on Baxter,” she smiled cunningly. “Get in...plenty of water and soap or do you want me to lasso you?” I was a steer and she was a roper when it came to the rodeo of the libido. I could not, nor did I want to break away from her gravitational pull. She started thrusting gently in the water with a gyrating torso that could power an industrial dynamo in anyone’s industrial revolution.”

I removed my gun belt, pants and shirt and joined her in the pool of purification. I was ready to empty every chamber in my gun. She could tell by my face and showed me where the bullseye was. I may been a sharpshooter….but could tell...she was calling all the shots

Chapter 23 - Pyramids, Pirates & Parrots

 

Isadora and I dressed quickly and met the others at the base of the pyramid. Isadora remained with the others as I ran up the steps one more time to confer with Diego.

 

Sandoz Diego Cerveza, aka El Diablo was a complex conundrum almost as puzzling as Balam, the diminutive guardian of Chichen Itza. Add to the odd mixture of traveling companions, one Jules Verne, part scientist, part fabricator of fairy tale fiction, along with

Isadora and Jean-Paul who were the gatekeepers to the Ninth Gate of Voodoo hell,   and I felt awash in an ocean of inventive imagination, floundering in a sea of surrealism.

 

“Now we’ve found the elusive stone step Diego, but I don’t see any entrance. Once again we hit a stone wall, literally!” I said in frustration. Balam, who made the trek up with me couldn’t contain his delight at my dejected state. “Look to the sky, Senor Dooley,” he remarked.

 

I did. I saw parrots! At first all I could see were colorful parrots and an absolutely clear as a bell blue sky, horizon to horizon. Diego smiled and pointed to a stone carving bas relief above my head. “Parrots, compadre. Two parrots mating.” Great! Two parrots fucking having a go at each other, what the hell kind of perverse clue was this?

 

“That my dear friend is the key. Pull on the male parrots, uh, head.” Which I did. Nothing. Nada happened. No amazing hosanna on high to accompany a great stone wall to recede and allow us to gain entry.  At least at 365 steps above sea level. Not until a few minutes later.

 

Just then a cacophony erupted from our group on the ground. “It’s opening!” Isadora screamed. “It’s opening!” Amazing what two fornicating parrots can reveal. We practically flew down the steps with real parrots soaring overhead as if in celebration at our solving the puzzle. Maybe now they were free of their duty and could go off to some  rainforest and do their mating in some form of avian whorehouse where parrots strut and parrots fuck.

 

The opening at the the top to the labyrinths that lay within was inviting us into its womb. Jules was so excited I thought his head would detach itself from his shoulders and end up in Parrot Paradise looking  to mate with a feminine Andean Condor! “I’ll get the lanterns,” he chuckled. “Gadzooks, this is fantastic!”

 

Diego looked puzzled. “Gadzooks? What does it mean, Senor Dooley?” I had only one response. “It means ‘I’m crazy’ and me thinks Mr. Verne is a few planets short of a solar system, if you know what I mean.”

 

Balam and his men handed up backpacks loaded with food. Rice, beans, sugar and flat breads for the journey, “I won’t be going with you, but be careful and read the signs. English pirates once came here over a hundred years ago in search of the treasure, but couldn’t solve the riddle of Step 365. The treasure was not to be theirs, so they left, heading back to the many islands in the Caribbean where we heard they were eaten by a tribe of Caribes...cannibals on one of them.”

 

Isadora hefted her pack as did the rest of us and with lanterns and food and dreams of riches we were ready for anything, real sons of bitches. Balam had one more  message f warning before Isadora, Jules, Diego, Jean-Paul, myself and 5 of Diego’s armed men were about to be swallowed whole in the belly of the Serpents womb tomb. “Read the signs and beware of the Chamber of Skulls and the Grateful Dead!” he cautioned. More hobgoblins to deal with. Superstition….magic….curses...skulls….grateful deads...and to top it off, oversexed parrots and sauteed pirates!!!

 

Isadora said softly to me as entered the void before us,  “Here’s my road to papa’s dream and your road to treasure Baxter. Paved with pyramids, pirates and parrots.”

Chapter 24 - Labyrinth of Skulls

 

 

Lanterns, food and water were made secure as we began our journey into the unknown. We had plenty of ammo and were well armed as well, but I doubt if a bullet would bring down the occasional pissed off cursed spirit hell bent on revenge for our trepidation causing intrusion that awakened their blood lust.

 

Jean Paul was mumbling some sort of all purpose Haitian anti-curse to ward off any tempermental Toltec terror that might fall upon us, while Jules Verne was astonishingly effervescent at the prospect that maybe he found another chapter or perhaps a whole book based on going deep into the bowels of the Earth. He was a literary sponge soaking up life and adventure to be placed on paper and placed between two leather bound covers acting as a womb until read by the reader giving birth to imagination and mechanical wonders before undreamed of.

 

Isadora was just as deliciously jaunty as a mountain goat in heat, taking the lead through the entrance chamber whose walls were adorned with “stories” told by way of pictures of snakes, weird flying discs and women with bare native  breasts and well aimed  fire shooting from their eyes. As a sideshow act as part of Brother Elias’ Traveling Medicine Show these ancient women today I imagine would sell a lot of snake oil poison to the sheep ready to be shorn of their dollars in every small territorial town between Denver and Laramie.

 

I was transfixed as the light from the lanterns danced in a liquid waltz off the stone walls of the dark chamber. Shimmering and bouncing off  intricate life sized carved figures of serpents and Mayan warriors. The stone figures were jet black, an ebony hue I had never come across before. These stones were perhaps mined elsewhere and transported here. But they were large and heavy...how were they brought to this location? One more mystery to be solved. Perhaps one more book for Jules.

 

Diego was the first to spot the entryway to what turned out to be a lower chamber that took us deeper into the structure and hopefully closer to the treasure that had us all in high spirits. “Ready Amigos, here we go.” Indeed, away we went further in and further down.

 

I kept waiting for the obligatory booby trap to spring itself on us causing death to one or more of our number and of course to keep the gods amused. Keep the gods laughing as dance hall comedians do to a drunken audience and you might have a chance at surviving any ordeal that involved retribution by angry giant serpents or little green men from space.

 

Just as soon as that thought escaped me, it happened. One of Diego’s men had wandered off down another passageway on an exploratory mission...it was the passageway of the Wall of Skulls!

 

Just as flames were depicted shooting from the eyes of the carved figures in the entrance, projectiles shot out of the skulls on the wall as this unfortunate retch passed by. By the time we responded to his screams he was already dead looking for all the world like an old spinsters pin cushion,  his curdling blood flowing from every penetration creating a poisoned puddle.

 

“We were warned about the Wall of Skulls” Jean Paul said firmly, adding, “Mwen pa renmen!” I didn’t like it either. Isadora shed some light on the quandry. “Papa told me about the Skulls when I was a child. I grew up hearing about this treasure every day. We must step carefully...one at a time. The skulls are known as the Grateful Dead. They were captured warriors from other warring tribes who were as you can see had their heads removed and placed in here as trophies after the treasure was secured in the chamber ahead of it. Poisoned arrows placed inside the eye sockets and released when anyone passing by placed pressure on the Key Stones which trigger the release..and of course the death of one whose folly brought him here...look they are marked with the sign of Kulkakan. Avoid those or...we’ll never make it. There are thousands of skulls imbedded and if we panic and run we’ll trigger them all and believe me we won’t survive.”

 

Gawd I love this woman more and more. She can not only raise the dead from a New Orleans cemetery with a chant or two in mysterious Creole, but can get us through the Gate of the Grateful Dead but can also make love with a hurricane swirling around her...she was a tempest in a tempest as well as a sexual temptress. If nothing else I had found  my treasure in her.

 

“Gents, I’ll go first,” she practically commanded. “Follow one at a time stepping only where I step and where the fellow before you steps. Baxter you follow me first, then Jean-Paul, Diego and Jules...the rest of the men can follow or wait here for us. The dream of my father should be in the chamber ahead. Now they are dreams.”

 

Jules was delighted beyond measure. “This is like taking a journey to the center of the Earth!!!”

Chapter 25- Underground World of Psychedelic Mushrooms

 

 

The passageway shrunk in size so barely a body could fit through, let alone some of the more rotund of Diego’s men who sported the girth of one of the Col.’s hot air balloons. Soon we had all managed to squeeze through and came out in yet another chamber festooned with pictorials of airships and ancient language of which even Diego was unfamiliar with. Inside ran a clear river, not wide, but deep, hidden all these eons underground creating a world of it’s own with it’s power of water.

 

More amazing was the flora of the chamber itself. It was a miniature forest of ferns, colorful plants bigger than the tallest man among us and red mushrooms so large you could use the stalks for building timber. The red mushrooms riding atop the stems were surely 5 feet in circumference.

 

The ferns were a rich green, yet there was no sunlight to feed them that which they needed from the sky. Even more amazing to us was the fact that the chamber forest was awash in a brilliant light!

 

“My father was fascinated with this chamber,” Isadora explained in the Creole rasp of hers that made my six guns cock themselves. “The light is from the walls and the river.”

 

It was so. The walls of the cavernous chamber were filled with shiny stones. Clear and prismatic if looked at from different angles. “Diamonds,” Diego whispered to me. Correct this academic bandit was. Diamonds! Thousands of them imbedded in the walls as a bullet in a gut of the loser in a showdown at high noon on Mainstreet in Dodge City.

 

The river was swarming with hordes of fish that gave off a small bit of light which in turn was magnified by the waters of the river in a shimmering pattern and reflecting off the diamond encrusted walls!

 

“It’s stunning!” Screamed Jules Verne. “It reminds of paintings by Renoir and Degas! Especially Claude Monets ‘Impression: Sunrise’. Many people in France couldn’t understand this new look on canvas, but I told Claude not to give up his style, or the others too. Call it Impressionism as art.  Label it and they will fawn and fall all over your flora and fauna!”

 

Even more surprising to us was the intrusion of a familiar voice, Balam! “You are almost there. I had no doubt with Isadora leading the way. Please, before we enter the last chamber that holds your dreams, might I suggest we each partake of a piece of mushroom. I think it will be an agreeable choice. Besides, it will enhance the experience of being in a room of gems, jewels, silver and gold.”

 

We felt obliged to humor our host in the hopes that the red mushroom was not a member of a family of fatal fungi. Cautiously we all took a piece Balam had in a woven basket. It didn’t take long for it’s effects to present themselves. I looked at Isadora who appeared to have sprouted giant blue wings that would carry her aloft. Her feet were of gold and golden rays seemed to  shoot from her eyes which were now not brown but as red as rubies as the carvings on the wall depicted.

 

‘Mushrooms of Meditation’ Diego declared. “Psilocybin to be exact. Very nice. Very nice indeed. Now we will see the colorful dragons before they attack!”

 

Jean-Paul was in a trance it seemed talking to the now shrunken head of the dearly departed Gallegos as if it were a pirates pet parrot. He kept telling the lifeless head to be quiet! Strange these mushrooms.

 

Isadora was the only one with her feet firmly on the ground and didn’t even notice when I yelled out to warn everyone of the giant yellow octopus with eight  heads dropping from the cavern ceiling speaking German and dressed as a female impersonator on the strasse in Berlin.

 

Balam was smiling that Midget Mayan smile that he must have used when he was Master of Ceremonies at the Saturday Night live virgin sacrifices. Rimshots and comedy to placate the patrons at the dinner show where laughter abounds as a virgin goes under the ceremonial knife. “Next show will be a matinee, folks. Bring the kids and enjoy the fun!”

 

Diego’s dragons were all around us, Jules was painting the air with invisible impressionist brushes, while Gallegos dead head became a ventriloquist’s dummy spewing profanity at  a congregation of Baptists in a tent, under the religious big top waiting for the really big show...the resurrection in three part harmony with a barbershop quartet bringing in the sheaves during the public hanging of Three Fingers Finnigan, bank robber, rustler, card cheat and cross dresser!

After a few hours the effects of the mushrooms subsided. I made a mental note. I loved my opium dens, but had to remember this chamber...dead heads...talking heads….dragons...to me this was pharma heaven!

 

“You have now earned the right to cross over to the Chamber of Dreams...Isadora will lead the way...if you please Ma’am,” Balam asked imploringly.

She lead...I followed her to her father’s dream, all of our dreams...soon...a reality.

Chapter 26 - Treasure & Alien Space Ships

 

At first sight, the magnificent cavern that held the world’s treasure a secret for centuries seemed to awaken from a slumber once Isadora had entered its chamber. Her entire body emitting a radiant rainbow of colors bathing the walls in a variety of  hues that seemed to originate from somewhere deep inside her. It was as if an inner power in her had been triggered according to the plan of the ancients who traveled the cosmos in search of new home planets, thanks to exploding suns, black holes and other nefarious scientific malfunctions of a not so perfect universe that threatened to wipe out entire civilizations.

 

Venusians, according to lore, sought refuge on Earth mating and mingling in the Yucatan as it’s own private bordello creating in it’s wake a race of Mayan Midgets. One Venusian, Queen Xantar, leader of the journey,  mated with Isadora’s father, and stayed along with others. When Isadora was born, a mutant by standards, not a midget, but would become tall and stately as her mother, the Queen.

 

Queen Xantar, impregnated in the Yucatan by her Earthling lover died in childbirth in New Orleans where she had taken up the study of the occult and the practice of Voodoo, which was passed along in her genes to her daughter. Isadora’s father kept the map to the treasure and protected it’s location until his death when it was time for Isadora to discover her own birthright and power on her own. It was so written.

 

It was as if the chamber had been awaiting Isadora’s arrival to begin it’s impromptu coronation. Her father, scientist and adventurer was after all a mere mortal human who mated and married Xanar, the mystery woman from Venus who bore him a girl-child, my Isadora who now became suddenly aware of her identity and purpose.   

 

She led us all though pathways lined with the fabulous riches of the ages brought here by the ancients for safekeeping until such a time as this….The Reclamation.

 

Balam walked religiously to Isadora bearing an amulet on a gold chain that he placed upon her neck. She raised her head looking to the cavern ceiling and in a commanding voice that seemed to emerge from another world “The treasure is within. Fill your dreams!”

 

Here were the riches of the Moors, the Mongols, the Roman Empire, the Mayans, Aztecs and those of Spanish conquest now laid before us as tribute to take and do with as we pleased. Balam, wise beyond time said, “Take what you need...use it to fill dreams. If you use it for evil, the greed will  kill you!” Christ, one more curse and I’ll fucking shoot myself!

 

Isadora started staggering and was sweating. I ran to her before she collapsed and held her in my arms. I was afraid the stress was going to kill her….not easy finally realizing you’re a creation of beings from two planets and you have more power than that locked up on the surface of the sun.

 

“Isadora, it’s OK. I’m here.,...let’s get out of here...you found the treasure..you fulfilled your father’s dream and apparently you’re own destiny.     

 

Balam smiled wisely. “You have chosen your treasure in Isadora wisely Senor Dooley. Unselfishly too, I might add. She has already chosen you!”

 

While everyone in the party loaded up with gold this and silver that,  not to mention diamonds and rubies and strange artifacts sure to fetch a few greenbacks at the museums, I carried only Isadora back to the entrance. Once there, we would allow the others left to guard our backside, banditos all, to be led into the chamber to take their fill of the booty.

 

As we emerged into the blinding daylight we were met with a sight we didn’t expect. Our men were completely surrounded by gunmen led by the Canadian pimp and swindler, Monty Debauchery!! He had caught up with us with our pants down.

 

“Ah, Monsieur Dooley. Thank you for leading us to the real treasure. Were it not for Senor Gallegos we would not have known of the switched maps. Unfortunately he also has a loose tongue and will turn on his grandmother for a drink and a 25 dollar gold piece. I see however, he now travels with the big fellow there.”

 

“Alright Monty, there’s plenty here to split. Much more than many of us can possibly use. Take the rest, it’s yours. We can call it even and no one has to die.”

 

“I would agree but I think we will take it all if you don’t mind. My men will go in and remove the rest. Balam here will lead us safely won’t you little man?”

 

Balam agreed reluctantly, but I could see a plan forming in his mind. Between the curses, boobytraps and Balams hidden army there was hope yet. I didn’t realize that Isadora alone was a tower of power in her own right, nor that Captain Marcel, by pre-arrangement had arrived offshore in a giant submersible ship he had developed awaiting our arrival with the loot. I also didn’t notice that Jules Verne and the Col had slipped away quietly and during the ensuing chaos were now out of sight behind the pyramid readying the flying balloon.

 

Now I just had to bide my time. C’mon Isadora! Jean Paul was sitting silently in prayer. As he swayed back and forth chanting, Isadora suddenly opened her eyes. The red was pure flame….”I love you Baxter Dooley. I know who I am now. With you I am whole!”

 

“I love you too Isadora, but right now we have a problem..see….in facta big Canadian problem. Monty’s here and I don’t think he wants to leave any witnesses!! You got any of that old fashioned voodoo mojo handy or that weird space eye ray thing I feel it might help at this point in time!”

 

 

Chapter 27 - Yellow Submarines & Sky Pilots

 

A contingent of Monty’s men,  12 in all remained behind to keep us as bay to prevent us from interfering with the plunder of plenty that was underway deep within the pyramid.

They had already relieved us of all our weapons that now formed a great pile of pistols, rifles, and knives out of our reach. I could see El Diablo, once an academic, now a pissed off pistolero ready to spring into action at just the right moment. His men too were itching for a showdown.

 

While Monty’s rear guard joked among themselves there suddenly appeared in the sky, the Colonel and Verne assuming the high ground. We knew the basket was a fully loaded nightmare of dynamite ready to deal death from above. We immediately broke rank and dove for our weapons while Monty’s men in mass confusion ran towards their horses.  

 

We began firing at them while Jules tossed lit dynamite towards the path of their retreat. Most of the horses bolted and ran at the first sounds of the cacophony leaving their riders laying in the dust. Bruised, bleeding and broken.  Ground fire and air support!  

 

El Diablo and his men took care of the mop up operation, tying up prisoners, taking care as best they felt of the wounded, and collecting weapons. Isadora, whom I had laid carefully on the ground behind an outcropping to shield her from the heat of bullets and bombs was now awakened fully, studying the carnage.

 

Now all we had to do was wait for Monty and his mercenaries to emerge from the pyramid, arms laden with treasure. The difference now is….we have the advantage ...the element of surprise. We’d take that treasure and add it to our massive pile and dole it out, then we we had to decide what to do with Monty and the remainder of his men.

 

We waited for hours and soon heard laughter and singing as Monty’s crew emerged with arms laden with treasure….only to find us in a standoff line laden with arms! The look of surprise was worth the wait.

 

“Well, Monty, it’s over me thinks!”

 

“What do we do now. You seem to have won the pot this time.”

 

“There won’t be another time,” Isadora spoke in a frightening tone. “Balam, remove their guns and have your men take the treasure and place it over here.”

 

I could sense she was inside my head, reading my mind, my thoughts, my feelings...and she was. It turns out Venusians, even half Venusians are telepaths so they can extract or inject thoughts into someone’s brain. Handy little trick. I was wondering what to do with all these captives now that they knew about, and where the treasure was hidden. There was still plenty more left over. More than enough! We couldn’t just turn them loose with that knowledge or it would be a free for all in the Yucatan!

 

Balam smiled, “I have an idea. Isadora can erase all memory of this place and the treasure from their minds. Like erasing a blackboard of a difficult math problem. That way the secret is safe. Also we can remove the treasure and place it elsewhere..someplace new….hidden...known only to Isadora. She can then parcel it out as needed.”

 

El Diablo and I agreed. “Great idea. Let’s go for broke!”

 

Isadora began the scan to erase all memories from Monty’s men. We had decided that El Diablo would turn over Monty’s men to the French claiming that they were the revolutionaries and for services rendered would receive the reward for their capture. We on the other hand would take Monty back to New Orleans turning him over to the Pinkertons to stand trial for his crimes.

 

The balloon landed gently this time with a beaming Jules Verne laughing hysterically. “What wonder, what joy this has been. I must get to my writing soon before all is forgotten!”

 

We packed up our horses, the ones we kept tethered on the other side of the pyramid, each loading up with shares of treasure, massive amounts I might add then we all headed for the coast first where Captain Marcel was waiting for us. Isadora had pre-arranged it so we could well get underway across the Gulf and back to New Orleans. El Diablo was asked to come along before heading back to Vera Cruz. Why? I had no idea.

 

As we came to the beach we were greeted by a magnificent, huge, floating yellow submersible. A goddamn submarine!!!! It was monstrous! “I had it built with my share of the forthcoming treasure. They knew I was good for my word….well, isn’t she a marvel!!”

 

It was a dream. We could load all our share of treasure aboard as well as our prisoner and have room to spare making our way back to New Orleans. Marcel then spoke to El Diablo alone and off to the side after which a large portion of El Diablo’s share of treasure was handed over and placed aboard the ship “Neptune” ...then El Diablo rode off to whatever awaited him. (I found out later, Marcel would exchange the treasure for weapons and sail off offshore of Vera Cruz where El Diablo would take the guns and continue his attack on the French forces with success to follow with the defeat and expulsion of the French.

We boarded the Neptune, myself, Isadora, Monty in chains, Jean Paul and his shrunken head, Gallegos, while the Colonel and Jules decided to sail the currents aloft and meet us in New Orleans. Gumbo and Gold...not a bad deal.

 

But….the story doesn’t end here...

 

Chapter 28 - Last Radio Broadcast

 

September 8, 1898

Personal Letter from Baxter Dooley

To: Prof. Sandoz Diego Cerveza

University of Mexico

 

I would like to commend you for taking on the task over these past decades of collecting copies of all my dime novels, letters, diaries, etc. and placing them safely in the university archives. Especially the Yucatan adventure. What grand days those were amigo! You’ll be happy to know Regina, our eldest is the mirror image of her mother Isadora at the same age!!! It’s frightening. She is not aware as of yet of what powers she has, and we may keep it that way. Or such is my hope. The Venusian bloodline is diluted by now somewhat.

 

As you are well aware there are more rumblings in the distance of upcoming revolution in Mexico as well as talk of war between the US and Spain over an island called Cuba. Too bad we’re not back in the game! What adventure would await us. We may have to put our pens down and load our pistols again! We’re getting too old for this shit.

 

I’m sending along some books, signed, Jules sent me of his writings. You may place them in the archives as well if the powers that be approved. He sent two of each, one in French and one in English. It seems he wrote different tales based on our ‘journey to the center of the earth’ as he calls it. Remember the young man he mentioned in New York state he befriended? Turns out he’s a writer too….his first book is about Father Goose but Jules says he also wants to write one about a land of little people, wizards, witches and magic. Sounds strange….maybe it will sell….another writer in England names H.G. Wells is also writing about time machines, Martian invasions and such and is giving Jules a run for his scientific reality money. This could be an exciting boxing match if it came down to that.

 

Monty Debauchery died in a lunatic asylum three years ago I hear. Seems Isadora didn’t quite completely erase his mind and left those images of mushroom dragons, flying submersibles and Midget Mayans. He tried to tell everyone they were real and coming to get him. Poor man, died in his cell one night with a look of absolute horror on his face. No one will ever know what he saw or what Isadora placed inside for him to see….

 

Jean Paul operates a first class restaurant in New Orleans as well as a rather popular bordello called the Rising Sun or something along those lines and is still dabbling in the dark arts of voodoo. Isadora is retired from that line of work. We travel a lot now. Currently making our home in the New Mexico Territory.

 

Isadora sends her love and we look forward to seeing you here at our hacienda during your summer break with your brood of “revolutionary” offspring and your beautiful wife, Esmeralda as our guests for as long as you care to stay.

 

I must close for now...but rest assured….the treasure is safe and when you want more just let us know. It’s hidden in an underground chamber beneath a curious large crater in Arizona thanks to Balam and his men.

 

Look forward to seeing you amigo!

--Baxter--

By October 30, 1938, the world had changed completely. It was also the month, day and year Baxter Dooley would die in his sleep, Isadora and their children at his bedside. It was then that Isadora gave a copy of a new treasure map to her daughter, Regina. Treasure this time hidden some say in Arizona. The torch had been passed!

 

He died but had the pleasure of seeing a motion picture called “The Wizard of Oz” at the local movie house. He and Isadora had to mask their smiles as the village of little people, or Munchkins, were played by Balam and the other Mayan Midgets. They had invaded Hollywood!!!!

On the evening of October 30, he was listening to his radio to a broadcast of music interrupted by a news bulletin read by a young radio announcer, Orson Welles. Martians were invading Earth near New Jersey!!! He began laughing and the family came into the bedroom as he was talking to himself now. Incoherently at first. “One more battle to go! Martians! Hot damn, call El Diablo and get the horses ready by dawn.”

 

Isadora leaned in close and kissed his lips as memories raced through his mind. Her tears fell to his face as she held him close. His eyes closed for the last time as he kissed Isadora and said…”You have always been my treasure!”

 

As he said those words a brilliant star was visible in the sky from the bedroom window. It was Venus in all it’s brilliance. Isadora bent her head to his chest…Goodbye my Baxter. Now sleep….I’ll join you soon, one day….we found our treasure ...in each other.

Impressum

Tag der Veröffentlichung: 11.01.2017

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Gunslingers Don't Sing and Dance is where Mayan Midgets, a race of inbred space aliens guard the treasure of the ancients. Toss in a Voodoo Queen, a headless horseman and Lincolns Assassination with a touch of Jules Verne and you have a rock and read of saloons and balloons. Gunslingers Don't Sing and Dance is where Mayan Midgets, a race of inbred space aliens guard the treasure of the ancients. Toss in a Voodoo Queen, a headless horseman and Lincolns Assassination with a touch of Jules Verne and you have a rock and read of saloons and balloons.