Feud On The Mesa (4 page)

Painted warriors slipped past in the night, their eyes glued to the stubbornly defended general store. Caleb went among them with the crouched, secretive grace of a puma. He saw Red Sleeves with a group of warriors around him. He waited, flat on the earth, for an opportunity to shoot or knife the leader, but had to give up since the braves continued to come in for instructions. Antonio was leaving the certain destruction of the embattled settlers to his fellows; he was searching for the captive who had antagonized him. The scalp of the Silent Outcast was worth more to Antonio than a hundred others.

Caleb was sneaking through the brush along the creekbed, toward his tethered Indian horse, when he heard someone skulking after him. He flattened in the moonlight and waited. It was a long wait, but eventually a ghostly form slithered into sight for a second, hesitated, listening, then came forward bent almost double, a pistol in one hand and a stained,
slippery knife in the other. Doom held his breath; Antonio had found him and was coming to settle with the frontiersman. Pushing gently against the cool earth, Doom shoved himself erect and waited. Antonio came on without a sound. Caleb took a big breath and stepped out of the eerie night and con-fronted the startled Apache.

Antonio blinked rapidly, tensed a little, and his thin lips parted over the strong teeth. Doom tossed caution to the wind and spoke musically in Spanish: “I should have shot you, killer of children and old women.”

“Why didn’t you, Silent Outcast?” Antonio straightened out of his crouch and looked triumphantly at the lighter, taller man with abiding scorn in his eyes.

“Because I want to kill you with my hands.”

Antonio laughed softly. He had noticed that Doom’s gun was stuck into his waistband, while the knife was held loosely at his side. “I am here.”

Doom’s first rush was a mistake and he knew it as the warrior side-stepped him. Antonio was grin-ning like a death’s head now. He contemptuously dropped his pistol and began to circle. Doom’s face showed no fear or anger; he was impassive. The furious gunfire from the besieged village came down the cool night air to them and mingled with the gentler sound of the little creek behind them. Some ragged, unchecked tongues of flame leaped luridly into the night and cast wild, quivering light over the battleground. Doom was conscious of the macabre scene around him as he watched the other working his way closer, knife extended and lying sideways in his corded fist.

Antonio leaped in and slashed cannily, aiming low. Caleb jumped back. He had not expected the leap,
and felt the breath of the knife a fraction of an inch from his stomach. Again Antonio came in, carrying the fight to Doom. Caleb affected to leap backward again, and the warrior, anticipating the maneuver, rushed him. It was a bad mistake and Antonio knew it when Doom braced and dropped low, but his momentum wouldn’t let him stop. He tried a half turn, but it was clumsy. Caleb’s knife streaked in, straight as an arrow with the watery light reflecting sullenly off the blade. Antonio felt the slight burning sensation as the knife bit into the flesh over his hip. He jumped frantically away and turned. Caleb was following up his advantage and caught the Apache with his shoulder and upper left arm before Antonio could regain his balance. They crashed to the spongy earth together, Doom on top.

Doom used his knee liberally and heard the half choked-off, half agonized moan as Antonio’s grip on his midriff slackened. Holding tightly, desperately to the slippery, lithe knife arm of the warrior, Caleb’s knife rose high and descended twice. Antonio locked his jaw against the flood of gall and blood that swelled in his throat. His eyes were fanatically filming over in implacable hatred and Caleb slashed ragingly once more, and the quivering, sweaty body went limp.

Caleb, unheeding, heard the crescendo of the battle surging around the general store as he dragged Antonio’s corpse into the brush. Unconsciously he knew that the few unfortunates, who had been unable to get to the store, had barricaded themselves in their hovels and had been killed.

Clarion clear in the cold predawn came the distant tones of a bugle. Caleb cocked his head incredulously. The closest soldiers were twenty-five miles away at
Fort Lauder. He heard far-off gunfire, like the pop-ping of many small corks, and the fury on his sweaty, grimed, and weary face softened a little. It was unbelievable that the troops were coming, but that bugle call was unmistakable. A rumbling roar came from up by the general store. The warriors were being ordered back by Red Sleeves, and their angry growls were interspersed with the cries of the remaining de-fenders.

Caleb found his Indian horse and swung aboard. The air was cold now, and faint, weak light was out-lining the wreckage and smoking ruins that cluttered the orderly landscape of what had been Clearwater Springs. He rode slowly through the tall brush and willows that lined the little creek. A band of retreating warriors splashed across the creek and thundered away toward the
ranchería.
Some carried bundles of loot for trade with Sam Ginn, who had stayed well out of rifle range during the fight, explaining that some of the defenders might recognize him. The braves were leaving before the troops could be seen. The bugle call and the rapid sound of pre-mature firing had run them off. Doom sat quietly in the saddle and watched them stream back over the rolling prairie. Some of the warriors were reeling in their saddles, others were swathed in crude bandages, some led riderless and stolen horses, while others rode exultantly, streams of scalps flying loosely from bridles, belts, and rifle barrels as they rode.

Caleb sat perfectly still and relaxed, as an unearthly silence settled over the settlement that only a few moments before had been washed over by savage screams and deafening gunfire. He looked up at the store; there was no sign of movement or life. He
knew the defenders were standing, red-eyed and fearful, awaiting the next act in the drama. His eyes came slowly around to where the attackers were, a disorderly mob of small figures riding out of sight in the near distance.

Suddenly a movement caught his eye in the willows along the creek. He watched closely and saw a late brave, loaded with a tablecloth stuffed with loot, creep down to the creek, drink deeply, clamber awkwardly back onto his horse, and start out after his fellows. Doom’s gun came up slowly, carefully, and he tracked the jouncing marauder. The pistol’s report was a belated, lonely sound in the dawn. The man’s horse gave a tremendous leap, bucked insanely for a second or two, sending the startled warrior sprawling on the ground, surrounded by his scattered loot. Then the animal tore off, head high and nostrils distended, after the other Indian horses.

Doom watched in surprise, concluding that his shot had missed the rider and had creased the horse. He shook out his own reins and splashed deliberately across the water, riding toward the brave, who was scrambling to his feet and jerking a battered six-gun out of the ragged folds of his breechclout. Doom rode methodically at a walk until he saw the other’s gun coming up, then he rammed his heels into the horse’s sides and roared, careening forward.

The warrior fired and missed. He stood, spraddle-legged, and cocked his gun again. Caleb was within good shooting range, and his gun sounded loudly in his own ears as he shot at the squatty, indomitable figure before him. The brave refused to budge an inch and fired again. Caleb felt the quick, shocking, half numbness that goes with being shot. He was flying into the face of his enemy now, and his gun
thundered three times in rapid succession. The hostile sagged, went down to his knees, and brought the gun up again. Caleb’s horse hit him with stunning force before the shaking fingers could tighten on the trigger, and the warrior went over backward, blood gushing from his smashed face where the horse’s knee had struck him solidly.

The brave’s one true shot had struck Caleb in the leg below the knee, had glanced off the shin bone, and torn a jagged, gory hole in his right leg. He made up a tourniquet out of the dead man’s headband, re-mounted, and rode back to Clearwater Springs.

Amid the acrid-smelling ruins of their settlement, a crowd of gaunt, red-eyed men and women were standing together with another group of grimfaced civilians. Caleb rode up somberly and they all turned to face him. He was surprised when Leclerc, the barman from Dentón, stepped out of the mob and nodded at him. “It didn’t work, did it?”

Caleb was tired and sore, but he understood that Leclerc was referring to Doom’s hope that he might be able to talk the hostiles into lifting their siege of Dentón. He shook his head slowly. “No. Not only didn’t work, but they brought me here to leave among the dead. Got away an’ tried to give the alarm but”—he shrugged and looked at the carnage around him—“I’m afraid I didn’t do much good.” He looked at the motley, dry-eyed mob and frowned. “Where’re the troops?”

Jock Leclerc shook his head harshly. “Ain’t none. Your horse come into the livery barn at Dentón last night, an’ we figured what was up, got together all the freighters and drovers that’ve been bottled up in town fer the last month, an’ backtracked him.”

“But the bugle?”

“Trick. We wasn’t strong enough to give’em battle. They was a helluva lot of’em, so we used the bugle to try a bluff, an’ damned if it didn’t work. They run like rabbits.” His swarthy face was puzzled. “Where in hell’d they all come from?”

An older man went up beside Caleb’s rapidly swelling leg and probed it. “Sit perfectly still,” he said. Caleb nodded indifferently and the doctor went to work. “Leclerc, you recall a man named Sam Ginn?”

The saloon owner snorted. “Sure, he’s one of the lowest
Comancheros
on the frontier. Troublemaker an’ renegade o’ the first water.”

“He’s talked Red Sleeves into forming a confederacy. He gets the loot and they get the revenge.”

Jock Leclerc’s features darkened under the rush of hot blood into his head. He bit down hard on the profanity that swelled in his throat. Suddenly his eyes came up hard and killing mad. “Can you ride?”

Doom nodded without answering, frowning into the protesting eyes of the little doctor.

Jock Leclerc swung to the assembled, white-faced settlers. “Git your horses. If the soldiers won’t do it, by Gawd we’ll have to!” There were some murmurs among the people and a woman started hysterical, high moaning. Another woman led her away as the settlers fanned out, looking for something to ride. Caleb listened gravely to the little doctor, nodded, and frowned at the throbbing leg like he resented its interference in the job to be done.

Leclerc was on his horse and beside him. “We gotta do it now. They’ll break their camp an’ slope an’ we’ll never find’em.”

“I reckon.”

“You can lead us to’em?”

Caleb nodded. “How many men you got?”

“Not enough. Eighty or so come from Dentón, and there must be about one or two hundred here.”

Caleb’s somber glance swept over the dulled, apathetic settlers who moved mechanically among the wreckage of their village. “There’s about five hundred fightin’ bucks in the
ranchería
, an’ maybe two, three hundred more oldsters and youngsters handy.”

Leclerc nodded thoughtfully. “I sent two men to Lauder fer the soljers last night. We’ll leave scouts here at the springs an’ at intervals out on the prairie to guide’em in when they get here. They oughta make it no later than midday, if they travel fast.”

Caleb’s dour glance was matched with his words. “I reckon…if they’ve got fightin’ officers instead of Eastern puppets.”

Jock Leclerc looked over at him quickly, under-stood the brooding look and said nothing.

T
here weren’t horses enough. What the attack-ers hadn’t stolen had been shot. When the party left Clearwater Springs, there were no more than 250, all told. They left guides for the soldiers at regular intervals as they rode. This, too, cut down their effective striking force. The sun was get-ting a good start across the firmament in the new day when they encountered their first Apache vedette. They were fortunate in outriding and killing the warrior. However, two more braves fled at their approach and made it to the foothills before the hard-riding settlers could catch them.

Leclerc turned to Doom and yelled against the whipping air that streamed past them: “They’ll be ready now!”

Doom nodded, white-faced and sunken-eyed.

Leclerc reined over closer. “Ride’em down?”

Doom looked around and shook his head vehemently: “Don’t dare! Not enough of us. Have their route scouted an’ try to ride far enough ahead of’em to lay an ambush.”

Leclerc wagged his head as they swept up the mountain pass into the fragrance of the pine and fir foothills below the Apache encampment. “Not a
chance, they’ll be watchin’ us like hawks, now that they know we’re comin’.”

Doom batted his eyes against the fuzziness that seemed to be eating at the edges of his mind. “Reckon you’re right at that.” He shrugged. “What-ever we do, tell the boys not to let the hostiles split’em up. Stay together…everyone. If we get divided, we’re goners.”

Leclerc shouted the orders to stay together and they were relayed back down the charging host of riders. Somewhere, up ahead, a rifle cracked and a ragged volley answered. A moment later, Doom looked down indifferently as he rode by, at the still, grotesquely sprawled body of a brave who had been shot out of a fir tree.

The excited, frenzied Apaches were breaking up their camp. They were in a broiling turmoil when scouts brought word to Red Sleeves that the settlers were coming. The hostiles were surprised that the pursuit was not made by soldiers, and Red Sleeves sent out a large body of warriors to try and find the soldiers he was certain were with the settlers. He feared a trick of some kind. Squaws were screaming at dogs and children and trying to load nervous, shying horses. There was a disorderly pandemonium throughout the camp that was only added to as the faint, unmistakable sound of a volley of firing stirred the feverish activity, each family trying to get away from the
ranchería
as quickly as the others. Much equipment was left behind as, inspired by Red Sleeves’s worried face, all grabbed what was handy and fled. Scouts came and went and still no sign of the soldiers could be found.