Blood Feather (20 page)

He doffed his hat, saying, “Ma'am, sorry to bother you. I live here and my name is Joshua Strongheart.”

She laughed, saying, “Oh hell, I know who you are, young man. How could I miss you?”

She then laughed at her own joke, and he grinned broadly.

She added, “That's about like saying, ‘Hello, ma'am, I am one of those mountains over there.' You are the most famous man in the territory. Now, what kin I do fer ya?”

“Well,” he said, “I just got engaged and was wondering if I could purchase a dozen red roses from you.”

“Just a minute,” she said and disappeared into her house.

She reappeared right away with a dozen long-stemmed red roses and handed them to him, explaining, “I just picked these right before ya came. So ya finally asked the Widow Ebert? Good fer you, young man. You jest love her and be yourself, and you two will stay hitched a long time. Now, shoo.”

He reached in his pocket for his money, saying, “How much do I owe you, ma'am?”

She turned from the door and threw her hand up in the air, saying, “Pshaw!” Then she walked into the little house.

Strongheart chuckled, shaking his head, and mounted up. He would give the dozen roses to his love and then get his saddlebags and bedroll and move them to the McClure House.

Strongheart rode the short distance to the café with thoughts about his life together with Belle, and he pictured them having little children. Missy was such a precious and brave little thing, she really impressed him and made him wish for daughters. He was determined to make sure Belle was well guarded and then go out and find Blood Feather and kill him. He had to eliminate that threat from her life, as well as his own. Any threat after Blood Feather would pale in comparison to the danger he presented both Joshua and Belle.

He tied Gabriel up to the hitching rack on Main Street and went in the front door of the café this time. Although it was getting late, there were still several customers. Strongheart's eyes went immediately to the far corner, and Deputy Vaughn was not seated there. Joshua figured he must be in the back, and Joshua wanted to be alone when he handed Belle the roses, but he went into the kitchen anyway.

Belle was not there, nor was Stephen Vaughn, and Joshua's heart dropped. All he could picture was Blood Feather brazenly coming into the café and kidnapping her away just to intimidate him. Although the killer was clearly insane Strongheart could now figure out some of the things he would do, and that would fit right in. Joshua could hear his heart pounding in his ears, and his forehead felt like it was on fire. The back door to the café was standing wide open.

Suddenly, a very large figure burst through the door, gun in hand, and Strongheart's Colt Peacemaker was out of his holster and cocked, pointing center mass at Deputy Vaughn's chest. Joshua uncocked the gun and reholstered it.

Vaughn explained, “I have been watching and being careful. A couple customers started complaining that their food was taking too long, and I knew she sometimes would stay back there if she had several orders to fill at once, and then bring them all out at one time steaming hot. I decided right then to come check on her. Then I went into a panic.”

Joshua could tell the big man was already beating himself up, but even as scared as he was, Strongheart knew there was only so much you could do. He looked around and saw two steaks burned on the stove, and he went over and removed them.

Joshua then saw that the big Navajo throw rug Belle kept on the kitchen floor near the door was gone. He knew immediately that Blood Feather, maybe dressed like a cowboy or a local, had come in the door, probably knocked her out, and secreted her away rolled up in the rug. But, he wondered, where would he take her? The most obvious choice would be her house. Then Strongheart's hope soared. Maybe she had received an emergency message to go to her house for something and run out.

Strongheart put his hand on the big deputy's shoulder, as the man looked like he was near tears. “Look,” Joshua said, “I saw you, You were being careful. Don't start whipping yourself over this. We have to find her. I am going to ride to her house. You start questioning everybody you see. Somebody saw something.”

Joshua ran out, praying already in his mind, and leapt into the saddle doing a running mount. Gabriel knew something was amiss. He had him to Belle's house in just minutes. Strongheart jumped off, ground-reined the horse, and drew his gun as he ran into the house. The second he hit the door, his heart almost exploded. There was blood.

“Oh no, God no!” he said aloud as he followed the blood trail to the bedroom.

“Please God, please God protect her!” Joshua pleaded as he opened the door to the bedroom, and almost fainted.

There she lay on the bed, arms spread out wide, naked, staring at the ceiling. He saw the blood everywhere, and the hole in her chest where her heart had been, and a lone eagle feather drenched in her blood was on her face.

Strongheart dropped to his knees and wept, and then bawled. He screamed a primal scream and dashed out the door and around the house looking for tracks. The neighbor saw him.

“Joshua, is Annabelle okay?” the neighbor said. “I saw a big cowboy in a slicker driving a buckboard pull up, carry a rolled-up rug into the house, and he left a few minutes later. It just did not seem right.”

Strongheart only shook his head. Stifling tears, he said, “How long ago?”

The man said, “No more than twenty, thirty minutes. Is she okay? Is everything all right?”

Strongheart said, “Belle is dead.”

The man screamed and ran around in a circle beating his legs.

Strongheart went back into the house. He returned to Belle and covered her naked, bloody body. Then he removed the eagle feather and kissed her face. He sat there on the edge of the bed where they had become one the night before and held her hand, looking past the blood. He did not want to remember her like this, but as she had been. Tears streamed down his face, and then came a pounding on the door. He wiped all tears away.

Strongheart went to the door, and there was a crowd outside the house, and the sheriff and Vaughn were standing there. Both were obviously out of breath. They came in at Joshua's signal and followed him to the bedroom, spotting the terror on the way. The sheriff put his hand on Joshua's shoulder.

“I am so very sorry, Joshua. We will get this killer,” he said determinedly. “I give you my solemn word.”

Strongheart said, “No, you won't, Frank. I will.”

The way Strongheart said those words made the sheriff not even consider arguing. He just nodded his head. Then he collected himself.

The sheriff became lawman again, and consoling friend, saying, “You do what you have to do. I will take care of the funeral arrangements, the coroner. I'll call Lucky, make sure her plants and flowers are watered. We will see to everything.”

Joshua grabbed his rifle, bedroll, and saddlebags out of the corner and walked from the room. The neighbor came up immediately outside and shook his hand offering condolences, and Joshua could not help but notice that every woman in the large crowd was weeping. He mounted Gabe and headed to the McClure House, then checked out and rode right back to the house. More deputies had arrived and a doctor.

Strongheart said, “Sheriff, please keep folks out of the kitchen a few minutes. I have to get ready to leave.”

The sheriff said, “Sure. But I have to ask. Where was the feather?”

Joshua said, “On her face, and she was naked. I covered her and removed the feather. I did not want anybody to see her that way.”

“Of course,” the lawman replied.

Joshua said, “I am going to leave a few things here in the living room closet. Somebody needs to tend to Belle's horse.

He handed money to the sheriff and said, “I sometimes have paid the kid next door to do chores. Give that to him for feed and care.”

He slowly removed his hat and put it in the closet, then retreated to the kitchen.

12

Vengeance

One half hour later, Joshua Strongheart emerged, and the house was filled with every type of person imaginable, and everybody just stared. Strongheart had his antelope-skin fringed shirt on, which stretched tight over his bulging muscles. His gunbelt and knife were around the shirt at his thin waistline, and he wore a Lakota breechcloth with decorative porcupine quillwork and beadwork. He had cut the sleeves off the shirt at the shoulders, and at the top of each bicep a leather band with a few ornaments was tied tightly, making the already-large muscles bulge even more so. His legs were bare and nothing but muscle upon muscle except for the many scars he bore. On his feet were Lakota soft-soled quilled moccasins. His hair was parted in the middle and braided Lakota style. Around his head he wore a beaded leather headband with a golden eagle feather and two bald eagle feathers hanging down and off at an angle. Strands of colored horse hair and several other decorations hung down across his neck. He wore a thick fur necklace adorned with each of the giant claws of the grizzly he had killed and that had left fresh claw and bite scars on his legs. What made jaws drop was his war paint, and the look on his face. He wore war paint that was black and covered the lower half of his face and a red raccoon-type mask painted across his eyes and temples. A vertical red stripe went from his hairline down his forehead, across his left eye, and down his cheek, all the way down to his neck.

In his hand was his powerful small hunting bow, and he wore his quiver of arrows on his back. Eyes straight ahead, Joshua walked past all the staring eyes, tied Gabriel's tail in a knot, and mounted up.

Everybody was seeing Strongheart the warrior, not the Pinkerton agent or the tall, handsome multiracial cowboy who quoted Shakespeare. They were seeing the son of
Siostukala
, Claw Marks, the late Lakota warrior, and in his eyes there was clearly a look of determination and passion. This was a man on a mission who would not be denied, and it clearly would be a mission of revenge.

The sheriff ran out while the crowd still watched spellbound.

He offered his hand to Joshua, who was already in the saddle, saying, “Good luck, Strongheart. My men found the wagon. He rode west out of town along the river road and had a large draft horse tied there. He abandoned the wagon and white man's clothes. He rode west.”

Strongheart said, “He will go north.”

The sheriff said, “Are you sure? How do you know?”

Joshua said, “I know how he thinks. That deputy is a good man and did nothing wrong to cause this. I think he is blaming himself.”

The sheriff said, “Do you know when you will return?”

Strongheart looked ahead, saying, “You will know when you see Blood Feather's scalp hanging from my saddle horn.”

With a simple “Thank you, Sheriff,” he squeezed his calves to Gabe's sides and galloped toward Pikes Peak to the north.

It did not matter to him that it was now past dusk. Joshua Strongheart had a man to hunt down and kill. Finding him would be easy. Killing him would be tough, but Joshua did not care if he was killed himself doing so. Blood Feather was going to die.

He decided he would head north out of town through Red Canyon, so called for its obvious rock walls and monoliths. Then he would continue on up Shelf Road toward the southwestern slope of Pikes Peak. After skirting around Pikes Peak to the west, he would head northwesterly through the South Park area until he cut the giant's trail. Until then, he knew he could make camp in the rocks and have a nice fire and sleep, which he had to catch up on to take on such a killer. It would also give Strongheart many days of solitude, which is what he sorely needed. There was no doubt in Strongheart's mind what route
We Wiyake
would take.

Joshua galloped and fast-trotted Gabe through the lingering dusk, deciding he would have to make the northern part of Red Canyon, where there were many herds of mule deer and elk grazing because of the lush grass, as there was good water there fed by many springs and Four Mile Creek. He made camp there with simply a small fire hidden among the rocks and curled up with his head on his saddle. He let Gabe graze all night in a nearby pasture.

Joshua lay by the fire warm as toast and dreamed about the woman he loved. The dream was very realistic because it was a memory less than two years old. Belle had been kidnapped by the hombre Strongheart was after, Harlance McMahon. The man intercepted the stagecoach on Road Gulch Road, not far from the base of the mountain where Joshua had been mauled by the grizzly bear.

Joshua heard the distant creaking and rattling of the traces and wooden workings of the big red Concord stagecoach. He moved from his hiding spot beneath the branches of a stunted cedar and climbed into the saddle. Looking through the trees with his telescope, he saw Harlance finally untie the thong from the carbine barrel and remove it from Belle's head. He had taken her away by tying the thong to his carbine and around her neck, so even if Joshua shot him from afar the gun would put a bullet neatly through her brain.

Holding Annabelle with his left hand, he stepped into the road and held the cocked carbine with his other hand.

Again, he appeared to be in his wide-eyed panic mode. The stage came into view, and the driver slowed the horses to a stop, holding his hands high in the air.

Harlance yelled, “Toss the express gun down!”

The driver carefully grabbed the double-barreled sawed-off shotgun at his side and tossed it into the road, then raised his hands again.

He yelled, “I ain't carryin' no strongbox, mister!”

Harlance ran to the side of the stage and yelled inside, “Everybody out, now!”

Five passengers, three women and two men, got out, hands raised.

Harlance had started to shove Belle up into the coach, when the driver decided to grab for his Russian .44 in a cross-draw holster. Harlance shot and the women screamed. The driver, dead, fell off the boot and released the brake. The movement made the coach lurch and knocked Harlance forward into the stage, landing on top of the rifle, which he now grasped in both hands. The stage horses bolted and started running in a panic down the winding Road Gulch Stage Road, driverless. Annabelle, seated in the coach, slammed both feet down on the rifle barrel, pinning Harlance's hands underneath it, and his legs hung out the door of the stage as it raced down the dangerous road. Harlance started cursing and threatening her, and she kept her weight on the rifle.

She looked up and saw Gabriel racing along parallel to the stagecoach, dashing through and around trees and boulders. Just as she feared that the mighty horse would trip over a branch, log, or rock, and both would go tumbling down, Joshua looked over at her, smiled, and winked. It took her breath away. This man was her hero for the ages.

Gabe came off the ridge and ran alongside the stage in the road, coming up next to the lead horses. Strongheart tried to reach over and grab their reins but could not. Belle still put her weight on the rifle as Harlance screamed, kicked, and struggled. She screamed as Joshua suddenly leapt from his saddle over the back of the right lead horse and landed on the wooden shaft running along under the inside traces between the six-horse team. He started to rein the horses in, but just then Harlance broke free, left the rifle there, and leaned out firing his pistol, hitting Strongheart in the back of his left shoulder.

Joshua fell beneath the horses, and Harlance grinned, holstering his pistol, and crawled out the door, up onto the roof, and into the box.

In the meantime, Joshua was underneath the center shaft, walking with his hands down one by one as he slid underneath the stage, his heels dragging in the dirt, his butt held off the ground. Watching carefully he walked his hands down the undercarriage of the stage, grabbed the leather thoroughbraces, and swung his legs up from the underside of the luggage boot in the back. He pulled down with his knees, grabbed the boot, and pulled himself up onto the back of the coach.

Harlance saw him and slammed on the brake lever while he pulled hard on the reins, yelling, “Whoa! Whoa! Settle down!”

He got the stage stopped and spun around with his pistol firing wildly at Strongheart. Inside the coach, Belle had stopped crying. Joshua was alive! Now, she could feel him moving behind her.

Strongheart reached for his gun and it was gone. Harlance sensed it and stood up on the roof.

“Lost yer gun, dint ya, ya damned blanket nigger! Go haid and pop that little red face up again.”

Joshua popped up and back down as a bullet flashed right over his head. Then he popped back up while Harlance cocked the pistol.

Strongheart's upraised right arm whipped forward, and his father's big knife flipped over once in the air, and buried itself in Harlance's hip. He screamed in pain, and Joshua knew this was his chance. He pulled himself up quickly onto the roof, and Harlance raised the pistol, grinning evilly.

“Whoopsy daisy, huh, buck?” he said tauntingly. “Now yer gonna find out ya ain't so tough. Where ya want it, half-breed, in yer haid or yer gut?”

Joshua said, “How about in you?”

He was just trying to joke in the face of certain death, but suddenly something exploded through the roof of the stage and both men heard Harlance's rifle fire below them in the coach. A bright spot of crimson appeared in Harlance's stomach, and he looked down at it in horror. Then Belle could be heard cocking the repeater, and she fired again. A second bullet exploded through the coach roof, smashing into Harlance's chest. He dropped his pistol and in sheer panic tore his shirt open, sticking his fingers in both bullet holes.

Strongheart said calmly, “The fingers won't help, McMahon. You are going to be dead shortly. Killed by a tiny, pretty woman who bested you. Take that to hell with you.”

Joshua laughed.

This realization hit him, and Harlance's face turned from white to bright red in anger. He started to speak, but when he did, blood spewed from his mouth, and he only gurgled. His face again turned white, ghostly white, and his eyes rolled back in his head. His body went limp, and he folded like an accordion, falling off the roof headfirst onto the dirt stage road. He did not feel it. He was already dead.

The door of the stagecoach flew open, and Annabelle, tears streaming, leapt out, smiling broadly. She looked under the stage and saw McMahon's lifeless body and dropped his rifle.

Joshua said, “You sure saved my bacon.”

She said, “Get down here now, redskin!”

They both laughed, and he climbed down, and she threw herself into his arms. They kissed long and passionately and were in that embrace when the stage passengers came running around the corner. One was carrying Joshua's pistol, and another the shotgun, and they were all cheering. The couple stepped back and looked at them and then at each other, smiling.

Strongheart suddenly saw the giant figure of Blood Feather, bloody knife in hand, diving off a large boulder at roadside, and his leap would send him crashing into Belle. Joshua sat up suddenly, heart pounding, breathing in deep pants. He looked all around and saw he was in his little camp at the north end of Red Canyon. He saw a few gray streaks in the eastern sky.

By daybreak, Strongheart was back in the saddle, bypassing breakfast. He had a man to find and a mission to accomplish.

Gabe ate up the miles as they slowly climbed through the canyon on the road, which would soon become a stagecoach toll road. There was also Phantom Canyon Road, which climbed up through another high-walled, narrow, rocky canyon, but it began on the east side of Cañon City.

That night, after pushing Gabe hard, Strongheart emerged on the western slope of Pikes Peak, where he would make another small, hidden, and relatively safe camp. On his backtrail he had figured the giant killer might try several ambushes, as he might not even be as far north yet as Strongheart. This time, Gabe had plenty of graze in and around the aspen grove that Strongheart camped in. Here he was able to let his guard down some, and he would get another good night's sleep, for the next day he should cut the monster killer's trail. But for now there was no reason to believe Blood Feather was within ten miles of him.

He had spotted a few deer earlier coming into the aspen grove, so he set up an ambush and took a two-year-old buck with an arrow. He would have fresh meat. He made camp, and it was warm and not visible very far because of the screen of trees. Strongheart was dead tired but was almost afraid to go to sleep. He finally did though and was very comfortable in this camp.

The general was appraising the tall Pinkerton agent as well. He could tell the man had been traveling hard for many miles. He read the dispatch from the War Department and the President's endorsement and smiled.

Then he simply said, “Glad I didn't hang the son of a buck yet.”

Joshua chuckled.

Davis went on, “I will send a dispatch back by wire and military courier stating I got your dispatch and will comply. No need to make you stick around for a trial. There is no doubt that Captain Jack and his owlhoots will hang, but I will keep Washington apprised up until they do. The orders make sense.”

Strongheart had traveled to the northwest to personally deliver a dispatch to General Davis directing him not to hang the notorious Modoc chief Captain Jack.

Joshua said, “General, I think I will resupply at your store and head on back to Colorado Territory.”

“I think it will become a state in a few years maybe. Heard some talk of it,” the officer replied. “Did you have much trouble getting here with the dispatch?”

Strongheart chuckled to himself. “Nothing I couldn't handle, sir. The Pinkertons deliver.”

“Surprised they hired a redskin, no offense.”

Joshua grinned. “None taken, General. They hired the white half of me. The red part tagged along.”

The general chuckled and then guffawed.

He escorted Joshua to the door and warned, “I have some men with pretty strong sentiments right now. I hope you understand.”