The Arrow Keeper’s Song (24 page)

The forest thinned farther up the ridge, and a shelf of granite thrust out as wide as a man was tall to form an overlook. Tom thought it the ideal place to check the patrol's backtrail, for the gray outcropping made a suitable bench and had a relatively unobstructed view of the valley below. The decaying remains of a
mangle blanc
tree had tumbled downhill and littered the shelf with branches and twigs. Tom climbed to the ledge and gratefully took a seat after checking the stone's mottled surface for scorpions and centipedes. He unslung his rifle, set it aside, and sat with his legs dangling over the ledge, his hands clasping the medicine pouch his father had given him. As he studied the surrounding mountains and the precipitous path they had followed since noon, a gentle breeze fanned his sweat-streaked features, providing a measure of cooling relief. He continued, unconsciously, to rub the buck-skin pouch with his thumbs.

He checked the distant skyline to north and east and south for any sign of pursuit but found nothing to be alarmed about; still, he continued to fix his steady gaze on the mountainous terrain and the valley they had traversed in the early-morning hours. An eerie silence settled over the land as if all the hills were waiting, watching.… Tom shuddered, half expecting to be revisited by the spirit warrior he had glimpsed back in Oklahoma. In a way, he missed the apparition, while at the same time dreading another encounter. Almost a year had passed since his departure from Cross Timbers, and there had been nothing to remind him of his heritage save the medicine pouch and the red clay pipe it contained. Now, in Cuba, anything seemed possible. Had the Maiyun abandoned him for a while, condemning him to their silence, to his empty wandering, unconnected, like a ghost trapped between worlds? Had an unseen hand guided his choices and set him on this path for a purpose he was yet to discover? These constant deliberations were driving him mad.

Tom forced his thoughts to return to the present, to escape once again the pain of the past. He imagined the American army was on the move by now, setting forth along the sea road on a course toward Santiago. Like some great shaggy buffalo plowing its way out of a wallow, head lowered, horns menacing, hooves pounding the earth as it gradually gathered momentum—so the American army would leave Daiquirí, the pace tortuously slow at first, but ever quickening until the troops became a juggernaut capable of overwhelming the Spanish fortifications. That would be something for even a ghost to see.

A twig cracked. Tom glanced around, one hand dropping to the rifle at his side. Enos Stump Horn stopped dead in his tracks, tomahawk in hand. He had climbed above the stone outcropping and slipped down on the other side of the shattered tree trunk to approach from Tom's blind side. But the debris left by the
mangle blanc
had tripped him up.

The big man's knuckles whitened as he gripped the shaft of the tomahawk, its forged-iron blade held down. No comfort there. Tom knew the man could throw underhanded and hit his mark with ease.

Enos, a large and formidable opponent with brawny arms and sloping shoulders, was made all the more intimidating by his ruined features. The man with the 'hawk had never been considered handsome, but after his previous altercation with Tom, poor Enos Stump Horn could have written the book on ugly. His nose was purple and swollen at the bridge, while the nostrils and tip were flattened and issued a slight whistling sound whenever he attempted to draw a breath through this bruised mass of cartilage and gristle.

The two men watched one another without speaking. Stump Horn's gaze lowered to the buckskin pouch and widened with recognition. He hadn't expected to find Tom praying, as it was common knowledge that the Arrow Keeper's son had refused the Mahuts when they had been offered to him. Yet here he sat with a pipe bundle in his hand. If he smoked the pipe, Enos would either have to depart in peace or confront Tom, disrupting the prayer and risking the wrath of the Maiyun.

Tom appraised the situation, seeking some way to avoid bloodshed. If Enos had come to try to kill him, he thought, better to settle the matter here and now, once and for all. He could think of only one way out of the confrontation, although it was not without risk. Tom eased his hand away from the trigger and slowly turned his back to the would-be assassin. A tingling sensation shot the length of his spine, and the muscles tightened along his shoulders. It took every bit of self-control he possessed to keep from chancing a look over his shoulder. He'd seen Enos drive that tomahawk inches deep in a tree trunk. It was an image Tom wished he could forget. Using every ounce of willpower, the sergeant focused on the valley stretching to the east. Minutes seemed to crawl past.

To his relief there came no whisper of an iron blade cutting the air, no painful impact of steel, severing sinew and spine. Yet the bleak sound of Enos Stump Horn's voice, the man's sense of betrayal at the hands of a friend, wounded Tom more cruelly than any blade.

“We had cattle, horses … the land was ours. We got along all right. But you and Allyn Benedict said it could be better.” Enoss voice grew thick with bitterness as he relived the unpleasant past. “You talked us into giving up the reservation and opening the land to the white man. We'd be citizens, you said. Well, we became citizens … with nothing.” Enos paused. “My father and many others sold their homesteads to the white settlers, figuring to put the money with the cash allotments and buy a piece of the oil fields. Only the government had already sold the north tracts to Benedict and the oil speculators. Nothing was left for us but the scrub timber and the range along the Washita to the south.” Enos took a step closer, his voice wavering. “Of course, you and Seth did all right. That's good range around Coyote Creek. But my father sold out for cash. When the government agents wouldn't let him buy into the oil fields, he went and gambled every dollar at Panther Hall. Father Kenneth found him the next morning, lying in front of the church. He'd put a bullet in his brain. I could have stayed around and worked in the oil fields, helped Allyn Benedict bring in his well. But this war seemed a better idea.”

“I'm sorry about your father,” Tom said. “But I didn't bring him to Panther Hall. He knew the way long before I ever spoke to him. But what the hell, Enos, blame me if it helps. Or if you must hate me, then make it for something I did. Hate me for being a fool. That's what Allyn Benedict played me for!”

Funny, Tom thought after his outburst. The hurt seemed less now. Even Emmiline's betrayal had begun to lose its sting. He wondered why. Was it Cuba or the company he was keeping? Still Tom could not blame Enos. Anger had a way of eating at a man and twisting him inside. But if blood was to flow, the man with the 'hawk would have to make the first move. And he'd have to make it soon. Tom shaded his eyes, checked the position of the sun, and announced, “Time to move out.”

He stood, slung his rifle over his shoulder, and tucked the pipe bundle inside his shirt. He glanced in Stump Horn's direction. The big man seemed torn with indecision.

“I have waited here long enough,” Tom said. He stepped from the ledge and proceeded toward the grove of trees beyond which the patrol waited.

Enos stared at the sergeant, taken aback by Sandcrane's seeming unconcern for his own safety. For months Enos had plotted Tom's demise, rehearsing Sandcrane's death scene should their paths ever cross. Now the moment had arrived to mete out justice—and Enos was questioning his own motives. Tom presented a willing target, and yet Enos suddenly lacked the will to take advantage of it. He wasn't even certain why.

A few yards below the ledge Tom paused and waved a hand toward the big man. “C'mon, Enos. We have a job to do,” he quietly said.

Again, silence. Again their eyes locked, though it was not so much a contest of wills as two men searching for the truth in one another. At last Enos Stump Horn sighed, tucked the tomahawk into his belt, and with a shake of his head for dramatic effect, started downhill. Tom doubted their war was over, but for the time being he'd gladly settle for an uneasy truce.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

T
HE NIGHT SKY WAS CLOUDLESS AND SCATTERED WITH STARS
, bright as diamonds strewn upon a black velvet table-cloth whose centerpiece was the silver platter of the moon. If heaven was bedazzled, the earth below lay stark and broken. The summer wind sighed among the rattling branches of the trees, moaned as it crept from the valley floor through crevice and cave, and scoured the hilltops, rushing on to other summits.

After reaching skyline earlier in the afternoon, Tom Sandcrane's patrol spent the remaining daylight hours following a ridge that stretched before them like the spine of some enormous beast slumbering in the earth. The ridge created valleys, blocked canyons, and skirted taller mountains. It rose and fell, crooked left and right, sometimes wooded, at other times barren and bleak and studded with slabs of gray rock. There was no visible trail to follow, but the ridge itself provided a natural path that was a challenge both for the horsemen and for the driver of the freight wagon. Tom did not regret his decision to follow Joanna's lead, despite the hard going. Several times during the afternoon he noted how the patrol avoided an intricate maze of arroyos and canyons. Joanna assured him the low road added a day to the journey. At one point Tom was certain he had glimpsed a column of riders in the pass below, and calling a halt, he surveyed the densely wooded gorge for ten minutes. When the movement failed to repeat itself, Tom gave the order to press on toward the crimson horizon. With their hats pulled low to shade their eyes from the sun, the soldiers obeyed.

At last, when the going proved too risky to continue in the dying light, Tom ordered a cold camp for the night. There on the crest of the ridge a fire would be seen for miles, and the last thing he wanted to do was announce their presence. Dinner was tinned beef and crackers washed down with water from their canteens. Tully found a pool of rainwater large enough to provide the thirsty horses with a drink before being hobbled in a sparse grove of sweet cedar. The soldiers unrolled their blankets near the wagon, a stone's throw from their mounts.

Joanna declined the army's offer of tinned beef but helped herself to a few crackers and left the campsite, canteen in hand, to wander along the ridge. She found an overlook that appealed to her and sat facing the north, the direction they would have to head come morning, when she brought the soldiers down from the ridge. She could sense the men watching her with unabashed appreciation for the thrust of her breasts and the curve of her hips, yet in no way did she feel threatened by the soldiers' scrutiny. Theirs was an honest, good-natured appraisal of her as a woman. After hiding out in the mountains these past months, Joanna thought, it was reassuring to know she could still generate a little masculine interest.

“That, my friends, is a pretty woman,” Philo muttered, peering at her over the tin in his hands. He shoveled a spoonful of congealed meat into his mouth and happily began to chew. The Creek breed had an iron constitution and was the only one among them who actually liked army rations.

“Pretty … hell. She's beautiful,” Tully said.

“Same thing.”

“The devil it is. ‘Beautiful' is something a man like you or me can never have,” Tully replied. “It's something fine. Too fine for down-at-heel ranch hands like us.”

“She's kinda on the thin side,” Enos spoke up. “A woman needs some heft, else there's nothing to hold on to in the night.” He glanced in Willem Tangle Hair's direction. “Now, a woman like Charlotte White Bear …”

“Best you hold that wagging tongue of yours or see it split,” Willem cautioned. His demeanor was cheerful but his words had an ominous ring. He set his tinned beef aside, stood, and made his way over to the horses, where he knelt by his own mount and checked its leg for any sign of swelling. He was relieved to find the animal still sound.

“You finished?” Philo called out, holding up the discarded tin.

“Take it,” Willem replied.

Philo nodded, pleased, and helped himself to more of the stringy brown morsels of meat in the tin. The other three men grimaced at the enthusiasm with which he ate.

“Must be part goat,” Enos muttered.

Philo was immune to insult. “You boys don't know what's good,” he said with an indifferent shrug.

“Yeah, but we know what's food,” Tully said, eliciting a laugh at his friend's expense.

Tom regretted putting an end to the levity, but there was work to be done. “Tully, once we reach the pass below, go ahead and prime the dynamite. And make the fuses short. There isn't any telling what we'll find when we reach Rosarita. Maybe nothing; then again, the place could be swarming with Spanish soldiers. The dynamite might give us the edge we need if they spring a trap and we have to fight our way out.” He stood and worked the stiffness out of his legs, then walked off from the three soldiers. His shadow in the moon's cold glare passed over their features—grown suddenly sober now—and flitted across the cedars and the stark terrain as he made his way to Willem's side. The gelding whinnied and tugged at its lead rope as Tom approached, but he gentled the creature by speaking softly and stroking the animal's neck.

“Charlotte's still a sore spot with you,” Tom said as the gelding shook its mane and then relaxed. A lengthy pause followed the statement he had casually dropped like a challenge. Willem stiffened at the name of Luthor White Bear's flirtatious daughter. “Why don't you marry her? Then you can take a stick to her if she ever looks at another man.”

The tension eased between them, and for the moment they were the friends they had been in childhood. “I was going to,” Willem said. “As soon as I staked claim on a tract of the oil land,” he sourly added. “Luthor wouldn't let her marry just some ranch hand.” The recent past had an ugly way of dampening a man's spirit.