Savage Arrow (2 page)

“I was on my way to Tombstone. The stagecoach was ambushed a short while ago by outlaws,” she blurted out. “The outlaws shot and killed the driver and threw him from the stagecoach. They . . . they . . . took my bag from the top of the stagecoach and ransacked it. They became angry when they only found my personal things, which were of no value to them.”

Seeing that she still had more to say, and glad that she did not seem afraid of him any longer, Thunder Horse said nothing, but instead listened.

“For a moment I was afraid that the outlaws would kill me,” Jessie said, her voice breaking as she recalled the vile, filthy men, whose features were hidden behind neckerchiefs tied around their faces.

“Go on,” Thunder Horse softly urged when he saw that it was hard for her to continue telling him all that had happened. “Tell me. Then the fear will be lifted from your heart and you can live better with it.”

Stunned that this Indian could be so gentle with her, so patient and caring, Jessie gazed more intently into his dark eyes.

She was shaken by how his eyes affected her. There seemed so much in their depths, unspoken words that might show her a world so different from any she had known before.

Jessie made herself focus on what she should be saying, instead of what she had been thinking. Today’s meeting with this Indian was just a chance encounter, and would soon be relegated to the past, like so many other things that had brought a moment of sunshine into her life.

“When the outlaws found nothing of value in my bag, or in the stagecoach, they grew so angry, they purposely spooked the horses,” she said, her voice breaking again. “I was left stranded inside the stagecoach.”

She looked to her right, toward the window at the other side of the coach, and saw the steep drop-off.

She shivered at the realization of how close she had come to dying there.

Feeling truly blessed that the Indian had come when he did, and had cared enough to save her, she glanced up again at him and smiled. “Thank you for rescuing me,” she murmured.

Then without even thinking about the fact that he was an Indian, not a white man, she said, “What . . . am . . . I to do now?”

Thunder Horse was so taken aback by the question, for a moment he could not respond. Instead, he searched her eyes, shaken to the core by what he saw.

Was it possible this woman had been brought to this place, at this moment in time, just for him to meet her? Had destiny brought them together?

Up until now, his life’s purpose had been to keep his people safe. Unwilling to allow anything to distract him from that purpose, Thunder Horse straightened his spine.

“I cannot take you into town on the stagecoach,” he said tightly. “The white eyes in Tombstone would not understand my reason for being with you, a white woman, on a white man’s stagecoach. They would shoot first, ask questions second.”

Jessie nodded. “I understand,” she murmured. “I am skilled with horses. I’ll drive the stagecoach into town myself.”

Quickly forgetting that only moments ago he had decided to ignore his feelings for this woman, Thunder Horse marveled at her strength and courage.

“Your name . . .” he asked, gazing into her green eyes.

“Jessie. Jessie Pilson,” she murmured. “And yours?” she blurted out. “Would you mind telling me your name?”

Thunder Horse’s shoulders squared proudly. His chin lifted. “Chief Thunder Horse,” he said. He noticed a new look of respect in her eyes as she realized that he was no mere warrior, but a chief.

“I am Chief Thunder Horse of the Fox band of Sioux,” he added.

Jessie was speechless again for a moment. She was in the presence of a powerful chief, someone whose main purpose in life was to protect his people. Yet he had gone out of his way to save her.

“
Hiyu-wo
, come, and I will help you up to the driver’s seat,” Thunder Horse said, reaching a hand out
for Jessie and helping her as she stepped from the stagecoach to the ground.

“Thank you,” Jessie said, her heart pounding when she found herself standing close to him. She was so close she could smell the fresh mountain scent that seemed to come from his skin.

She gazed up into his eyes from where she stood a head shorter than he, and found him gazing just as intently back at her. Her knees felt strangely weak.

She smiled somewhat bashfully, then stepped away from him and hurried toward the front of the stagecoach.

Suddenly she felt strong hands at her waist, lifting her, and a moment later she found herself sitting on the driver’s seat. Thunder Horse placed the reins in her hands.

She tried not to see the blood on the seat that had been left there by the horrible murder of the driver.

She made herself focus on getting into Tombstone.

“Are you certain you can do this?” Thunder Horse asked, bringing her eyes back to his. “Will you be alright?”

Jessie still could not believe the gentleness of this chief.

But it was clear he was concerned about her. She could tell by the softness and the careful way he had lifted her onto the seat.

Actually, she hated to leave him, for she doubted that she would ever see him again. It was obvious he normally avoided white people.

“Yes, I’ll be alright,” she finally replied. “But . . .”

The pleading in her eyes as she gazed into his made
Thunder Horse feel there was a real connection between them, yet he knew that he must avoid these feelings.

He must remember that she had come to this territory for her own reasons. Reasons that had nothing to do with him.

Someone must be waiting for her in Tombstone, where many evil men lived. He could not even imagine that sort of man touching this beautiful, sweet, and gentle lady.

“You were about to say?” Thunder Horse prompted, eager to know what else she might need from him.

In truth, he hated letting her go, for more than likely, he would never see her again.

“I would feel better if you could stay close enough to watch me get safely to Tombstone,” Jessie blurted out.

Then she said, “But I wouldn’t want you to be close enough so you would be seen. I . . . wouldn’t . . . want you to get into trouble over me.”

She wondered at herself for asking help of an Indian, when it would make more sense to be afraid of him. She had read horror stories about what some Indians did to white women. But she just couldn’t see this man committing such crimes as rape or murder.

“I will ride far enough behind you not to be seen, yet close enough to make certain you are not accosted again before you reach the town of Tombstone,” Thunder Horse promised.

He was curious to know why she was going to a place like Tombstone by herself. But he didn’t ask. Such a question would surely make her uneasy.

Instead, he would see her safely to the outskirts of Tombstone, then hurry on his way. He was anxious to get back home to his ailing father.

His father did not have much time left on this earth, and it was his father’s health that had kept Thunder Horse from taking his people to the reservation assigned to all Sioux.

“Thank you again for what you did for me,” Jessie said, hating to say good-bye.

These moments would stay with her forever. When she was sad and lonely, she would think of Thunder Horse.

“Go with care,” Thunder Horse said, nodding at her.

“I shall,” she murmured, then took one last lingering look into his eyes before forcing herself to turn away from him.

She snapped the reins, and the team of horses responded to her command, taking off in the direction of Tombstone.

Thunder Horse waited for a moment, then followed a good distance behind her. As he watched her riding ahead of him, his thoughts went again to his people’s situation.

Ho
, yes, the white chief in Washington had given permission for some of Thunder Horse’s band of Sioux to stay at their village until his father passed on to the other side. His father would then be placed with the other chiefs in the sacred burial cave of those who had gone on before him.

Afterward, Thunder Horse would lead what was left of his Fox band on to the reservation.

The white chief had met personally with Thunder Horse’s father in Washington, to discuss peace between them. A final agreement had been made that Thunder Horse’s people would join other Sioux bands on the reservation. But on the way home from Washington, his father had become desperately ill.

When the white chief learned of his father’s illness, he had sympathized with Thunder Horse’s dilemma and had given his permission for some of Thunder Horse’s people to remain at the village, while others had gone on to the reservation. Everyone would come together again after his father’s interment in the burial cave.

When Thunder Horse saw Jessie reach the outskirts of Tombstone, his thoughts returned to her again.

He dismounted, tied his horse in a clump of scrubby bushes, and made his way stealthily to the shadows of an outbuilding at the edge of town. He had decided he would not return to his village until he saw who met her . . . whom she had come to Tombstone to be with.

He hoped that she hadn’t come to live in prostitution as so many of the women in town did.

He watched her stop at the stagecoach station. He kept watching as several men came out and began talking to her.

The longer he watched her, the more he was taken by her loveliness, and by her courage!

Jessie tried to remain calm as several men ran up to her as soon as she drew the team of horses to a halt in front of the stagecoach station.

The men all seemed to talk at once, making Jessie’s head spin as she looked from one to the other.

“What happened?”

“Where’s Tom, the driver?”

“Why are you driving the stagecoach?”

“Where is your luggage?”

“Please . . . please . . . !” she cried, waving a hand in the air toward them. “Please stop all these questions. Just . . . justgivemea chance to get off this horrid stagecoach and then . . . then . . . I’ll tell you everything.”

One of the men stepped forward and raised a hand to help her, which she readily accepted.

Once she was on solid ground, with her beaded purse, which she had rescued from inside the stagecoach, gripped in her hand, she inhaled a nervous breath. Before she spoke, she looked past them in the
direction where she had last seen Chief Thunder Horse. There was no sign of him.

“Well? Where’s Tom?” one of the men said, bringing Jessie out of her thoughts to the morbid task at hand, for she had the terrible chore of telling these men that Tom had died at the hands of outlaws.

“I’m so sorry,” Jessie said, her voice catching as she looked slowly from man to man. “Tom is dead. We were ambushed—”

“Dead?” they all seemed to say at once.

“Yes,” Jessie said solemnly. “The masked men seemed to come out of nowhere. They killed Tom, stopped the stagecoach, and—”

“How did you live through it?” a man shouted.

“I truly don’t know,” Jessie said, visibly shuddering. “Once they had the stagecoach stopped, all they seemed interested in was my trunk. They took it down, but when they opened it and saw that it held no valuables, they cursed, then . . .”

She stopped before telling the truth of what had happened next, for to tell them that the outlaws had fired their guns into the air and spooked the horses would be to tell them Thunder Horse’s role in rescuing her.

She knew it was not best to tell them that, although what he had done was valorous. He had saved her life.

Still, she knew that Thunder Horse would not want to be mentioned. He would not want these men to know that a powerful chief was so close to their town.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” one of the men
said, staring incredulously at Jessie. “A mere woman managed to get out of that fracas alive, and then drove a team of horses on into Tombstone.”

Several others commented favorably about what she had done, while others quietly studied her, as though they suspected that she had left an important ingredient out of this tale.

“And so they just rode away without another thought of you?” one of the men said, raising an eyebrow.

“Seems so,” Jessie murmured. “When they saw that only my clothes were in the trunk, they were furious, but fortunately they didn’t shoot me. They were masked. I could never identify them.”

“Yep, all masked men look alike,” one of the men said, kneading his whiskered chin.

“Poor Tom,” another one said, then tightened his jaw. “We’ve got to go and get him.”

“And I’ll send out a search party for the hooligans that did this to Tom,” the sheriff said, edging his way through the crowd until he reached Jessie’s side. “Ma’am, I’m sorry your trip to Tombstone was marred by the likes of these outlaws.” He removed his wide-brimmed cowboy hat and half bowed toward her. “My regrets are real, ma’am.” He straightened his back and plopped the hat back on his head. “While the men are getting Tom, some will retrieve your luggage. I’ll have it back to you before nightfall.”

Then he idly scratched his brow. “Might I ask what brings you to our lovely town of Tombstone?” he asked, staring directly into her eyes. “Where can we deliver your luggage once we rescue it?”

Jessie looked slowly around her at the men. Their attitude had changed at this question and their eyes seemed to glisten suddenly.

She recognized their prurient interest in her. Did they actually believe that she was there to work in a saloon, dance hall, or worse . . . ?

“I’ve come to Tombstone to live with my cousin Reginald Vineyard,” Jessie said, noting disappointment in some of the men’s eyes. Others seemed taken aback by the mention of her cousin’s name.

“I’ve arrived on an earlier stagecoach than Reginald had expected,” she murmured. “Could someone among you direct me to his house?”

“You won’t find Preach at his house right now,” the sheriff said, looking past her, down the long road, at the white church that sat at the far end. He turned slow eyes back to Jessie. “It’s Sunday. Preach is always at the house of the Lord on Sunday.”

The men’s way of calling her cousin “Preach,” made Jessie’s eyebrows rise. She never would have guessed that Reginald would become a preacher. Although as children he had been good and kind, he had not been one to go to Sunday school or church services with his family and Jessie’s, who always attended together.