“Stop cryin’ gringo, soon all your troubles will be over.”

Artemis by Souter The rider was stunned; he sat up and began brushing off his clothes, as if he had just finished breaking a fresh pony. Chica threw a rope around the man before he could sense the danger he was in. She dragged him at full gallop a hundred feet or so, to take the fight out of him. She tied her rope off, Alanza keeping the rope taut as Chica walked up on the prone rider. The man looked on in disbelief.
“You little brown bitch, you shot my horse!” He looked at her angrily.
Chica pulled her pistol and shot the man in the thigh; the bullet tore a long trench through his chaps and lodged below his right buttock. He swore and screamed violently.
“Jesus, Lady!” Chica had the man’s attention now. She stood over him and placed a foot on the wound in his leg.
“Why are there so few of you, gringo?” She let up on his leg so that he would not scream so loudly.
“I don’t know, I don’t know. My God, I’m dying.”
“You are not dying, gringo, but you are lying.” She cocked her piece again, and it barked flame, shattering the femur of his other leg. He screamed again, more loudly this time.
“Oh God, oh God, please don’t, please stop.” He held up his arms, hands clasped together in prayer.
“Tell me, gringo.” She cocked her pistol a third time. “Next will be the cojones, gringo. You speak a Spanish, gringo?”
“No, no, please, no.”
“Cojones is your nuts, gringo. You understand?”
“No, please,” he was crying more intensely now. He had a hand over each thigh wound, but quickly covered his genitals. “We were supposed to come in and shoot, just shoot, then turn around and ride out. That’s all, that’s all.”
“What about the Capitan Welles, you weren’t to kill him?”
“No, no.” The man now knew that Chica was aware of the assassination plot. “Welles isn’t to be killed. It is the other captain, Walsh, and the governor.”
“Keep talking.” She ground her foot into his right thigh, then eased up.
“The other Captain, Walsh. They’ve been poisoning him and he’s going to be killed this morning. The rest of our gang is going in to his ranch to kill everyone there and all of his stock, to make it look like an Indian attack.
“Oh, God, my legs hurt so bad.” He sobbed and began rocking back and forth. “Another group is going up to Tucson and kill the Governor as he travels from his home to his office. I swear, I swear.”
“Stop cryin’ gringo, soon all your troubles will be over.” The Mule Tamer