hills, weaving amongst the cactus and the greasewood. It was rolling land,
broken by short sawtooth ranges of dull red or brown rock, and occasional flows
of lava marked by the white streaks of dry washes. Indians rode on all four
sides of me, always alert, always ready.
Nobody talked.
Each step my horse took seemed to be carrying me closer to death … escape
would be too much luck.
I could expect no help from the Haddens. I had no idea how I was going to get
the squaw away from them, and I felt sure they had no intention of letting her
go free. Even among good men the depredations carried on by the Apaches had
created the desire to exterminate them, one and all … and the Haddens were not
good men.
Me, I always had great respect for the Apache. He had learned to live off a
mighty bleak and hard country, and he had none of the white man’s ways of
thinking, and you had to reach out to try to understand how he felt and what he
wanted to do.
After a while we began to see more cholla, great stretches of it, all pale
yellow under the bright sun, with the dark browns and blacks of the old branches
down below. Jumping cactus, we called it, because if a body passed too close if
seemed to jump out to stick you. The Apaches thinned out to single file as we
went through it.
All of a sudden we drew up. Kahtenny turned and pointed out a low mountain ahead
of us, off to the east. “It is there they are,” he said, “at Dead Man’s Tank.
They are six men, and my squaw, and they want you.”
They wanted me dead.
Though Kahtenny would have killed me without waiting if he figured that would be
enough, he was no more trusting of the Haddens than I was. They would get my
body, but that didn’t mean he would get his squaw.
“You’re going to have to give me my guns,” I said. “If I ride in there without
them, they’ll kill the both of us if they can. I figure to handle the Haddens.
Without them, the others aren’t likely to cut up no fuss.”
The funny thing about it was, all day my mind had been miles from that hot
desert and back in the hill country of the Cumberland. They say a man’s whole
life passes before him when he’s about to die. I can’t say that mine did …
only those times back in the mountains, so long ago.
All day my mind kept going back to turnip greens, and to wild-hog hunting in the
hills on those foggy mornings when the forest dripped and a body prowled through
it like a red Indian, scouting for wild hogs to give us bacon to cook with
turnip greens in an iron pot. Me and Orrin used to go out, or sometimes Tyrel,
though he was younger. Never knew Tyrel to miss, though on occasion I did.
I’d never seen that country since. Never seen it … but I hankered for it. Many
a time on the desert I looked up to the stars and wished I was back there,
seein’ the kitchen door open with its light shining out and me coming up from
the milking with my pails full to overflow.
You wouldn’t hardly think my mind would be on that now, with the trouble I was
in right this minute, but that’s the way it was … as if I had to give my mind
some ease with good rememberin’. So all the time, as we rode along, my thoughts
kept going back to that green and lovely country.
I thought of the time I floated down the Big South Fork on a flat-boat to New
Orleans, taking what we had to trade — corn, sorghum molasses, and maybe some
tobacco. We Sacketts never had much to trade except muscle, because our poor
ridge-land didn’t raise more than enough to feed us, even if we hunted the
forest too. But folks liked to have a Sackett along going downriver through some
country where unruly folks were liable to be. My thoughts came back to where I
was, and I saw that Kahtenny was pointing out the land. “You go,” he said, “you
go get my squaw.”
He handed me my gun belt and Winchester, and I checked them for loads. My mouth
felt as dry as one of those empty creek beds.
“You keep an eye out,” I said. “Maybe I won’t be comin’ back with her.”
We sat there a moment, and then I held out a hand. “Loan me a spare,” I said. “I
may need it bad.”
Well, sir, he looked at me, and then he taken out his six-gun and passed it
over. It was a Navy .44, and a likely piece. I shoved it down in my waistband
back of my vest.
Toclani rode up. “I will go with you,” he said.
“No, thanks. You stay here. If they see me comin’ alone maybe they’ll let me get
close enough to talk. If they see two of us comin’ they might just shoot.”
So I spoke to that ga’nted-up black horse and we started down, and back behind
me Kahtenny said, “You bring back my squaw.”
I’d be lucky to do it. I’d be a whole sight luckier if I rode out with a whole
hide.
“All right, horse,” I said to the black, “let’s go talk to them.”
And we rode through the cholla toward Dead Man’s Tank.
Chapter 17
The vague blue feather of smoke lifted faintly above the rocks of an old lava
flow. I could hear my horse’s hoofs strike stone, or his muffled hoof-falls in
the sand. I sat tall in the saddle, Winchester in the scabbard, my mind open and
alert.
There can be no planning in such a situation. Until a man is in the midst of it,
he has no idea of the lay of the land, no idea of how the ones he’s going to
meet will be strung out. You just have to ride in and handle it by main strength
and awkwardness, with maybe the salt of a little luck.
The men up ahead wanted me dead. No doubt they had me in their sights right now.
No doubt they were holding off to crow over me and mine, or to see what I had to
say. As to that Apache squaw, they didn’t care one whit. But the Haddens were
new in Apache country, and they had no idea what they were up against. If
Kahtenny didn’t get his squaw, nobody was riding out of there with a whole skin
… not if Kahtenny could help it
There was a little thorny, scraggly brush growing amongst the rocks, but the
land around was mostly slabs of broken rock, falls of talus off the slopes, or
ridges shoved up through the sand.
Glancing back, I could see two Apaches back there, and only two. That meant the
others had scattered out and even now were moving in, getting in position for
the kill.
Now, I’m a peace-loving man, inclined to easy riding and talking around a fire,
and the more Apaches I get around me the more peace-loving I become. Riding up
there to those rocks around Dead Man’s Tank, I could feel my scalp a-prickling
as if it guessed it was going to be lifted.
I taken the thong off the hammer of my Colt, and I rode up a narrow trail
through the rocks and looked over into a shallow basin.
Dead Man’s Tank lay before me, a pool of water maybe ten feet across, each way.
Beyond it was a mite of fire, with the thin line of smoke losing itself in the
sky. I could see half a dozen horses, and what might be the ears of a couple
more beyond the rocks.
The Haddens were standing wide-legged facing me, and there was a man higher up
in the rocks with a Winchester across his knees. Two more were by the fire, and
likely another might be somewhere about.
Right beyond the fire was Kahtenny’s squaw, and even at this distance I could
see she was both young and pretty. She looked straight at me, and I was betting
she was counting on Kahtenny to get her loose from this setup.
And then I saw Dorset.
Dorset, and one of the youngsters. I gave a quick look around, but saw neither
hide nor hair of the others. Maybe they were dead now, or else were crossing the
border to safely.
Arch Hadden was looking right at me, and he was smiling, but there was nothing
you’d call friendly in that smile. “Well, look who’s here,” he said. “That
would-be tough Sackett.”
“Got a message for you, Arch,” I said, resting my hands on the pommel, left hand