McAllister Rides (12 page)

It seemed that he swam like that for an eternity, kicking against the fury of the water, going under every other stroke, taking in pints of water, choking and gasping for air. When his muscles seemed that they could take him no further, he tried searching for bottom and found it. Then the water got its grip on him again and he went down, floundering helplessly, losing the woman again. Catching sight of her drifting away from him face down and still, he grabbed her by the hair and dragged her to the shore, picked her up and fought his way out of the water that tried its damnedest to reclaim him. But he made the top of the steep bank and laid her down for a moment, belching and retching on the water in his belly.

When he got to his feet at last, his legs were shaking like aspen leaves. He fought the weakness, got the woman on one shoulder and started off along the bank, hoping that the pressure
on her belly would get some of the water out of her. After a dozen paces she started coughing and spluttering. He stopped, laid her on her face and started putting pressure gently but firmly on her back to get the water out of her lungs. She lay there coughing and moaning. He looked at the camp and couldn't see much, but utter confusion reigned there. He hoped it would stay that way for a while. He worked on her for five minutes, then asked her how she felt.

“Like I'm dying,” she told him.

“Can you walk?”

She sat up.

“I'm not walking,” she told him. “I'm going back.”

“Across my dead body.”

“That's the way it'll be when they catch you.”

“They'll kill you too if they catch us.”

“Iron Hand wouldn't do that.” She seemed sure.

“Look,” he said. “I'm hired to rescue you. You're rescued and you're going to stay rescued.”

She leaned forward and laid a hand on his arm.

“You listen to me,” she said. “I can never go back to Bourn.” He didn't miss that, the way she called her husband by his last name. “He wouldn't want me.”

McAllister saw his five hundred dollars disappearing in a high wind.

“We'll talk about that later,” he said firmly. “Right now, we're heading out of here.” He got a grip on her wrist, pulled her to her feet and started out along the creekside. She hung back a little, felt the strength of his pull and decided to go along quietly. After a little while she said: “You really reckon you can get away?”

“I don't reckon nothing, lady,” he told her. “There ain't a buck back there that can't track better'n a dozen whitemen. Come daylight they're going to be after us. But I ain't beat yet.”

She stopped walking and he stopped too.

“Just think,” she said. “If you let me go quietly back there and you went on like nothing had happened, they wouldn't come after you.”

He laughed.

“They'll come after me,” he said.

“Why?”

“I owe 'em a scalp.”

“What happened?”

“I shot up a passle of 'em.”

She made a funny little sobbing sound in the darkness and he started pulling her up the side of the canyon, going up the narrow trail that he hoped would take them to the top. It wasn't easy climbing with a woman dragging on the end of your arm, but he wasn't going to let her go. It turned out the trail didn't go to the top but levelled out and started along horizonally. Then it dipped again and they were down on the creekside and able to walk side by side. She wasn't walking too well, because she couldn't walk on the loose rocks with no covering to her feet, but she didn't complain and McAllister took notice of the fact. He assessed as well as he could in the dark as they walked because he and this woman had a long way to go together and whether they won through rested to a certain extent on what kind of a woman she was.

After a while, the rain stopped and the sound of their footsteps changed. McAllister stopped and tried to pierce the gloom with his eyes. He couldn't be sure, but he thought they were in the side canyon. A couple of minutes later, he knew for sure because he walked into a wall. He realised then that he could not hear the creek. He stood still, holding the woman motionless, trying to get the feel of the place and didn't do much good, so he pushed on, feeling the wall with his hand. He didn't do that for long because he ran into rocks and brush. When he had groped his way around these, he stopped, knowing that he wasn't doing much good. He thought back over his movements, looked at the plan of the country that he kept in his head and reckoned that the
canelo
was about three miles north of the spot he stood on.

“You good for a long walk?” he asked.

“I don't want to walk anywhere,” she told him.

“Look, girl,” he said. “We're getting outa this, you and me. We'll get out, you'll see. And when you're out, you'll be real glad. Believe me.”

“I keep trying to tell you,” she said. “There's nothing for me to go back to.”

“There's your husband. He thinks you're worth five hundred dollars.”

“Not the way I am now. Like this I'm not worth ten cents.”

“That's between you and me. No call for him to know.”

“You'd lie for your money?”

“I'd shoot my grandmother for five hunnerd dollars.”

“If you're that kind, there's nothing more I can say.”

“Sure I'm that kind. It takes that kind to get women like you away from a passle of Indians. Come on.”

He pulled her on down the canyon and they walked. He had to admit that she was game. She swung along sturdily at his side and he never had a complaint out of her though she must have been going through hell with her bare feet. Once or twice she stumbled, but he held her on her feet. They pushed through the blackness of the night never pausing.

He didn't know for how long they had walked, but it was a long time. The wind had dropped and it was warmer. At any other time he would have been concerned at their being in the cold night air in their wet clothes. Now he had only the thought of their reaching the
canelo.

He stopped, listening.

From up ahead, a little off to one side, he heard the soft whinny of a horse. Was it his?

“We're halfway out of the wood, girl,” he said. “That sounds like my horse.”

She gave a little sobbing sound, her wrist was torn from his grasp and he heard her hit the ground. Dropping on his knees beside her, he knew a kind of pity. The ordeal of the last few hours had been a strain on him. It must have been a hundred times worse for her. Picking her up, he walked with her in his arms. She was a solid weight. He whistled and heard the horse shuffling toward him, hampered by the hobbles. In a few moments, the
canelo's
soft nose touched his face. He spoke to the horse and it whickered gently in happiness. This was a one-man horse and they both knew it. McAllister walked on with the
canelo
plodding beside him until they were in the
little rincon sheltered from the wind. He laid the girl on the ground, felt her pulse and found that it was beating regularly. She was no more than bushed and he couldn't be surprised after the pace he had hit. When he had fetched his rifle and saddle and after he had thrown the hull on the horse, he returned to her. After some water had been trickled down her throat and he had chaffed her wrists a little, she started to come around.

He asked her how she felt and she said she was all right, but he knew that she was tuckered out. But there could be no stopping. The rain had stopped and the Indians would find their tracks in the daylight. Really he had to have the mule he had left at Islop's place, though he weighed the pros and cons of letting the
canelo
struggle along with a double load. He would lose time if he went back for the mule, but the
canelo
would be played out in no time at all if it carried double. So he decided on the mule.

“Feel strong enough to ride?” he asked Mrs. Bourn.

“Yes,” she told him and he gave her a boost into the saddle. The
canelo
thank heaven did not seem to object to her, but then McAllister was there leading it. He hit a jog-trot that he knew he could keep to for hours. His gun troubled him banging up and down on his backside, so he took off his gun-belt and hung it on the saddle-horn. Then he hit a good pace again and kept to it. The sky had cleared a little and there were a few stars out so that he could see a little of what was around him and that helped. Mrs. Bourn rode hanging onto the saddlehorn. He couldn't see, but he reckoned she had her eyes shut and that ride was something of a nightmare of weariness for her. But she didn't complain. She stuck up there on the
canelo's
back and stayed with it. He felt a twinge of admiration and pity for her. He got his second wind and loped along like a hound-dog. After a while, the sky started to turn a cold, pale gray and he knew that dawn was at hand. He didn't like that one little bit. Chances were that he and the woman would be caught slap-bang right out in the open. But one good thing happened that cheered him a little – the sky clouded over and the rain started to fall again.

They came to the end of the canyon and faced a steep climb. He halted and looked at Mrs. Bourn. She was crouched forward in the big saddle, her face drawn and gray, her eyes
shut. Her hair was plastered to her face and she looked pretty wretched. Maybe old man Bourn wouldn't have thought her worth five hundred dollars if he could have seen her now.

She opened her eyes and looked at him, but it was as though she didn't see him. Her eyes had the faraway look that comes with utter tiredness.

“Get down,” he said. “We have to climb now.”

He helped her down and her legs buckled under her so that she would have fallen had he not held her in his arms.

“I'm sorry,” she murmured.

“Could happen to anybody,” he said. “Take it easy. Couple of minutes and your legs'll be as good as new.”

But it was a good fifteen before she could stand on her own and McAllister was champing at the bit to go. He told her to get climbing and she did go a few feet, but her legs gave under her again and he was forced to put her up on the
canelo
again. It was tricky getting the horse up the narrow trail that was little more than a goat track and they were compelled to stop several times when they came to difficult spots, but finally they made it to the rimrock and McAllister, his muscles aching from the steep climb, set off running again with the
canelo
with the woman up trotting behind him.

As he ran, he watched the country, fearful for the show of a feathered head against the dull sky, but luck was with them and they saw none. He traveled fast for an hour and then there they were above Islop's canyon and he was helping her down from the saddle. He untied his slicker, put it around her and let her lie for a while.

“Rest up while you can,” he told her. “I'm going to spy out the land a bit.”

She lay down and looked at him. He thought that her eyes were the most beautiful he had ever seen; their loveliness came as a shock to him. Her mouth, he saw, should have been soft and smiling, but now it was compressed and set tight as though it had been hardened by a bitterness that had been there before she had been taken by the Indians. He found himself patting her shoulder, wanting to comfort her in some way and his sudden feeling of tenderness surprised and dismayed him.

“I'm a burden,” she said. “You could get away on your lonesome.”

He grinned.

“I didn't come here to get away on my lonesome,” he told her. “I come to get away with you. Don't fret none – we'll make it.”

“If you leave me, Iron Hand won't harm me. Go while you have the chance.”

“You're wasting your breath, lady.”

He lay on the edge of the canyon with the glasses in his hands and he gave the country below him a good looking over. He could see nothing that moved except for a couple of ponies that he guessed belonged to Islop. He thought he could risk going further west and taking a look at the house. When he went back to her, she was asleep and it seemed cruel to wake her. But he did. She came awake slowly and reluctantly, but when he told her to get into the saddle, she did so without a word.

He got a hold of the
canelo's
line again and set off, running. When he had covered a mile, taking advantage of all the depressions in the country he could, he halted again, helped her down and took another long look at the canyon through the glasses. He had the house in sight now and there didn't seem anything wrong down there. One of the women was splitting kindling in the yard and old Islop was there in his chair with his jar. A few horses and the mule were in the corral. McAllister reckoned he would risk going down. He would have to sooner or later if he wanted that mule. He put her back on the horse again and started down. When he reached the flat, he set off running again.

As he ran, his mind worked. He knew full well that in spite of his having looked over the canyon carefully, he might be trapped at the house. After all, it might be the first place the Indians looked. If they caught him around the house, he could make a break for it, if he and Mrs. Bourn managed to get mounted. But if the Indians spotted him from above, he'd never get either of them out of the canyon alive. He wouldn't be able to make the rimrock and the only way out would be down-canyon into the great canyon and there several hundred bucks would be waiting for them. So while he was getting that mule was zero hour.

Old Islop was still sitting in his chair, pipe in mouth. When he saw them come out of the trees, he did nothing more than
take his pipe out of his mouth and stare. McAllister expected to see him get to his feet, but he didn't move. The whole incident had an uncanniness about it that made the hair on the nape of his neck rise. The young Indian woman stopped splitting wood and just watched them with impassive curiosity. They reached the corner of the corral and McAllister halted. He put the
canelo
's lines in Mrs. Bourn's hands and said: “Stay right there. Anything happens, you make a break for it.” His instinct for danger was working overtime and Islop sitting there like that didn't help to damp it down.