Pale Moon Stalker (The Nymph Trilogy) (20 page)

Max nodded, revealing a flash of white teeth. The smile did not reach his stone-cold green eyes as they swept over the fat man and his squat companion. "Just so."

"Oh, shit, this ain't good, Ralphie," the smaller man whispered. Like a bird mesmerized by a rattler, he was too frozen with terror even to turn his head from Max to his friend.

The fat man observed Max's wolfish grin and started shifting from one foot to the other, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down beneath the fatty pouch hanging from his jaw. "Lookee, please, Mr. Limey, they ain't no wanted posters on me er Winnie er Peetie neither," he said, gesturing to their companion sprawled in the dirt, moaning.

"Is that a fact?" Max replied as if dubious.

"Don't believe him, Limey. He looks like a killer to me. Look at those piggy little eyes," Sky said, still watching the crowd, trying to gauge their mood. So far they appeared to be amused, but she knew that could change in an instant.

So did Max, as he said, "I believe you gentlemen should meet my, ah, associate." He nodded to Sky. "This is Calamity Jane, trained by the prince of pistoleros, James Butler Hickok himself. She can shoot out a gnat's eyes at fifty feet."

"She don't need to demonstrate on us," Ralphie pleaded. "We wuz jest tryin' to find out where this here ole Injun got hisself sech a good piece o' horseflesh. Bet he stole it."

"Yeah, he gots to have stole it," Winnie echoed hopefully, eyeing the tall old man who was now picking himself up from the ground and dusting off his bare arms and buckskin leggings.

Beside him stood a handsome mouse-brown gruella with a gleaming black mane and tail. "A fine specimen, indeed," Max concurred. "Perhaps we should ask him whether or not the horse belongs to him."

"H-he don't speak no English," Ralphie volunteered.

"By the sounds of it, neither do you," Sky said pleasantly as she dismounted and stepped forward. Her expression was icy. "I suggest we shoot them, Limey."

"B-b-but he's jest a Injun," Winnie interjected, as if trying to appeal to the Limey's white sensibilities.

Max could sense Sky's anger without looking at her. "Bloody hell, I was hoping to walk away without killing you, but now you've put the pot to boil. You see, gentlemen, the reason my partner is so furious is that she's part Indian herself."

Both Ralphie and Winnie gulped in unison, blanching white as flour. "We didn't mean no offense, ma'am, honest," Winnie begged.

"He's the one whut said it—not me," Ralphie supplied, backing away from his former friend.

Max's eyes swept the crowd. They all appeared more interested in seeing some gunplay than in having a breed and a foreigner taken down a notch. "Calamity, even in this godforsaken place, we can't just shoot them without giving them a sporting chance. What say we allow them to draw first?" he suggested calmly.

"Why not?" she replied through gritted teeth, uncocking the Yellow Boy and lowering it to her side.

Max slipped his Smith & Wesson into its holster so smoothly, neither man could follow the movement.

Winnie started moaning. "Oh, shit, oh, shit, this is bad, Ralphie."

He was not telling the fat man anything he did not already know. "Lookee here, I kin make it up to the old Injun. I got me some cash money here from my last job." Ralphie pointed to his left pocket.

Max nodded approval as he very slowly reached down and pulled out a wad of bills. He waddled over to the old Indian, who stood with his arms crossed on his chest, ramrod straight and dignified in spite of the bloody evidence of his recent beating. But when the fat man began to search for a place to deposit the money, he found that his victim's buckskin leggings and leather vest had no pockets. Neither did the old man reach out for the bribe, but rather stared straight ahead as if the fat white man were invisible.

By this time, Ralphie was virtually sobbing in frustration and low rumbles of coarse laughter and catcalls had erupted in the crowd. Ralphie, Winnie and their semiconscious friend were apparently not well-liked in Tumbleweed. Then Winnie spied the old man's leather sack lying in the street beneath the horse's hooves. "Put it in his bag, yew turd," he hissed at the distraught Ralphie.

Taking his cue, the fat man lurched over to the horse and squatted clumsily down, seizing the pouch and stuffing the money inside it. He grunted as he struggled back to his feet, sweat running in rivers down his face. "We wuz only funnin', Granpop, honest," he said to the stolid Indian. "Yew keep yer horse. Yessiree." He looked pleadingly at Max.

"I don't know. Since the gentleman has made reparations for his unwarranted attack, it might be construed as murder if we shoot him and his charming fellows." Max casually turned his back on the men and whispered to Sky, "Love, you are facing more dead brain tissue than one could find on the laboratory slab at the London School of Medicine."

Sky's eyes never left the two quaking bullies as they began inching away, deserting their moaning friend still lying in the dirt. Then a grim smile spread across her face. "My, look at poor Ralphie. He's just committed an act of public indecency," she said.

Max turned to observe the stain at the crotch of the fat man's breeches as it moved down his leg with great rapidity, no doubt filling his scuffed, filthy boot. "All right, you two, pick up your companion and be gone," he commanded sternly.

"Well done, Limey," she said as the men each grabbed an arm of their downed friend and dragged him around the corner to jeers from the crowd. She turned to the elderly Indian man to ask if he was badly injured, but his dark fathomless eyes were fixed on Max, who had just removed his hat to wipe the perspiration from his forehead.

"Praise the Powers!" the old man cried as he pointed to Max. "The Pale Moon Stalker has come!"

Chapter Ten

The old man had spoken the words in a foreign tongue that Max did not understand. With piercing dark eyes, the Indian studied the white man. Max felt peculiarly unnerved by the intense scrutiny. Turning to Sky, he asked, "What is he saying?"

"It's Cheyenne, but I only know a smattering of the language. He calls you the Pale Moon Stalker. It was your hair, that was what caused him to name you—almost as if he recognized you."

"That might not be good. Lots of men recognize the Limey. Usually they're not friendly. Can you communicate with him?" he asked.

"I'll try." She reached out to the tall old man, placing her hand on his arm, then said in halting Cheyenne, "I am called Sky Eyes of the Ehanktonwon, Grandfather. This is my husband, Max Stanhope. Who are you, and why do you call him Pale Moon Stalker?"

"I knew you were of the blood, even though it runs thin in your veins," he replied in Sioux that was far more fluent than her attempt at his language. "I am called True Dreamer and many times in medicine dreams I have seen this man with hair as pale as a cold winter moon. Among the whites, he is a hunter of evil men, is this not true?"

Sky nodded, not at all certain how the old man could know this or what it meant. "We track an evil man now," she said carefully.

"I know." True Dreamer's assurance appeared unshakable as he continued. "The man you stalk is the same one who has stolen my granddaughter Fawn. He comes from across the great waters, from the same place as the Pale Moon Stalker. I will guide you to where this evil one hides."

Sky's heart began racing. How could the old man know this...unless he truly had medicine dreams? She had known very few among her people with this gift, but had seen many charlatans over the years.

Sensing her confusion, Max interrupted. "What's going on, love?"

She shook her head. "Let me think." She asked True Dreamer, "How do you know where the man we seek is?"

"You have many questions, Daughter. But this is not the place or the time to answer them," he said, gazing at the remnants of the crowd staring at them. "I invite you and your man to share my campfire this night. Then I will explain many things that you wish to know."

Sky looked at Max and started to translate the invitation, but before she could utter a word, the old man said in clear but slightly halting English, "Pale Moon Stalker, I would be honored if you and your wife would come with me. I have...news...you will welcome."

Max and Sky exchanged startled glances before he said to her, "I repeat, what in flaming hell is going on?"

"He knows who you are—and that you and Deuce are both English. He's a medicine man among his people and he's had a vision about how to find our quarry. I think it's worth a try. Let's accept his invitation."

Max sighed, replacing his hat on his head. "Considering that every bed or pile of straw in this noisome town is crawling with vermin, sleeping under the stars once again holds considerably more appeal." He nodded politely to the old man. "We would be pleased to accept your kind offer."

As if expecting this acquiescence, True Dreamer grunted and swung onto the gruella with the effortless grace of a much younger man. "Come."

With that, he kicked his horse into a brisk trot, heading down the dusty street. Max and Sky mounted up and followed. The ride was brief, just a few miles outside of Tumbleweed. True Dreamer had chosen his campsite judiciously. It was well hidden from the trail and concealed by dense brush and scrub oak growing alongside a small, clear stream. Max had the feeling that everything the old man did was done judiciously.

Dusk fell like a silver-gray shroud as they dismounted. The old man had a fire laid, ready to light. A few meager possessions were arranged neatly on the ground. A brace of rabbits, freshly killed, hung suspended from one of the higher tree limbs. Had he been expecting them before he rode into town? Max noted a rifle, a Springfield breechloader, old but serviceable, leaning against the tree trunk. Why had he not gone to Tumbleweed armed?

The hairs on the back of his neck prickled in warning, but the man called True Dreamer started the fire and then went about cleaning his kills and spitting them on green twigs. Sky, apparently accepting the situation, pulled a sack of beans and a pot from their packhorse and started to prepare them. His stomach growled. Well, better to receive whatever news the medicine man had on a full stomach, he supposed, placing grounds in the tin coffeepot. He walked to the stream and filled it with water, then set it on the fire to boil.

After the old man chanted a brief benediction to whatever deity his people worshipped, they ate in companionable silence. In deference to her role as a woman traveling with "warriors," Sky took their dirty utensils and carried them to the stream to wash them, leaving her husband and True Dreamer alone by the flickering campfire.

When she returned, she was startled to see that Max had already retired to his bedroll and was soundly asleep. The wizened Cheyenne sat on the bare earth nearby, chanting softly as he wafted smoke toward the sleeper from a small dish directly above Max's head. The wisps True Dreamer fanned over Max smelled familiar to her—white sage, a healing plant used by her people as well as other High Plains Indians.

Without turning his head, he smiled and spoke softly in Sioux, "Now he rests undisturbed for the first time in a great long while." He stared with kindly eyes at the sleeping Englishman. The old man's face was burnished by the light of the fire, making his coppery skin seem to glow from within.

The hairs along Sky's arms and neck began to rise. "Max usually doesn't sleep this soundly," she said hesitantly. "You've drugged him." Yet, as she looked at Max's peaceful expression, she knew her voice held no condemnation. "You take much upon yourself, Grandfather."

He interrupted her by placing his finger to his lips, indicating she should lower her voice. "That is a privilege of the old. I would never do anything to harm the Pale Moon Stalker. He will save my granddaughter from the weasel-snake who holds her prisoner. Please sit. You and I must speak of many things while your man sleeps."

He gestured to the campfire several yards away, then arose with amazing gracefulness and walked over to it. They took their places facing each other across the fire. "He will awaken in the morning refreshed after happy dreams. Now he plays with an older boy...his brother, perhaps. The dark warriors will not return this night."

Sky gasped. "What do you know of these dark warriors?" she asked quietly, her heart hammering.

"The Powers have shown me that he was a soldier of the Great Mother Queen who rules across the waters. He wore a red coat..." His eyes stared beyond the flames to where Max slept, as if seeing another time, another place.

Sky shivered, knowing that she was truly in the presence of a great medicine man. She said nothing, but waited for him to continue.

"The Pale Moon Stalker led his soldiers in a battle against warriors whose skin was the color of your hair, Daughter. Again and again the dark warriors came, brave and fierce. Their numbers were like the leaves rolling across the ground in the time of the Hunting Moon...many more warriors than we had in the Valley of the Greasy Grass where we destroyed the Long Hair Custer. Your man had many fewer soldiers than Long Hair. Yet they threw back the dark ones time and again."

He closed his eyes for a moment, as if living that horrendous experience himself. "It was a fine battle with much bravery on both sides." Then he nodded and opened his eyes, fixing them on her as if waiting for her to speak, and knowing what she would say before she said it.