following us?” Dorset asked. “I don’t know,” I answered, and said no more. The
sun disappeared and shadows gathered in the folded hills. The shadows lifted
questioning fingers, stark against the yellow sky. The quail began to talk
across the silences, the wind stirred, rustling the dry leaves on the parched
brush. Our horses’ hoofs whispered in the sand.
A lone coyote showed for an instant, then like a shadow was gone, leaving no
more sign than an Apache. A few stars began to appear … one bright one was low
in the sky, and held steady. Time to time I looked at it, and finally I said,
“That there’s a light. A fire, maybe.” Dorset turned her head to look. “It’s not
an Indian fire,” she said.
We drew up, and I turned, standing in my stirrups to look back.
“It might be the Haddens,” I said. She glanced at me. “After you finished with
them? What you didn’t get, the Apaches got. You took two of them, I’d swear.
Maybe three.”
Well, maybe. I wasn’t making any claims. I never was one to file notches on a
gun … a tinhorn trick.
“Shall we try for it?” I said. “It’s closer than the border. And the border
never meant anything to an Apache except that south of it he was free of the
American troops.”
“We can scout it,” Dorset answered. She swung her pony and headed toward the
fire.
The yellow sky faded into gray and velvety dark. Even before we came up to it, I
could see it was an Army fire … it looked big because there were three of them
in line. It was a Cavalry troop of maybe forty men. We pulled up and I hailed
the camp.
“Howdy, there. Is it all right to come in? There’s a woman and a child with me.”
Silence …
It was a long moment, and I guess somebody was trying to make us out with field
glasses, though now there was not much light.
“All right,” came the answer. “Ride in. Ride carefully.”
I knew that voice. It was Captain Lewiston. Lieutenant Jack Davis stood beside
him.
Lewiston looked from me to Dorset Binny. He tipped his hat “How do you do,
ma’am. We have been worried for you.”
“I’m all right. Thanks to Mr. Sackett.”
“Did you come upon any other youngsters, Cap’n?” I asked. “Harry Brook and the
Creed youngsters?”
“They’re here, and they’re safe. That’s why we waited for you.”
We walked our horses into camp and swung down. I staggered when I hit ground,
and Lewiston was beside me. “Here, man, you’d better sit down.”
“Got to care for my horse. You take the lady and the child, Cap’n, I — ”
“No.” Lewiston’s tone was suddenly stern. He turned. “Corporal, take this man’s
horse. See that it is cared for just as mine is. The others also.”
He turned back to me. “Sackett, I regret to inform you that you are under
arrest.”
Me, I just looked at him. “For crossing the border? Cap’n, Laura Sackett told me
her son had been taken by the Apaches.”
“She has no son!” Davis spoke sharply. “Sackett, that’s a damned — ”
Lewiston’s voice cracked like a whip. “Lieutenant!”
Davis stopped, his face flushed. “I tell you, Captain, this man is — ”
“Silence! Lieutenant Davis, I suggest you inspect the guard. Whatever needs to
be said to Mr. Sackett, I will say.”
Davis turned on his heel and stalked away. “Forgive him, Sackett. He’s young and
I’m afraid he’s smitten by Laura Sackett. He is very proud, and he feels he must
defend her honor.”
“Let him defend it, Cap’n, but keep him away from me. Him being new to the
country I might not shoot him, but I am afraid if he said what he started to say
he’d be shy a good many teeth.”
“There will be no fighting. You seem to have forgotten, Sackett. You are under
arrest.”
Well, I just walked over to the fire and sat down. Then I dug into my gear which
had been dropped there and got out my cup. Reaching for the pot, I poured
coffee.
“All right, Cap’n,” I said, “you tell me about it. Why are you arresting me?”
“You are under arrest for murder. You are under arrest for the murder of Billy
Higgins.”
“Higgins?”
“We found his body out on the Yuma road. He had been shot in the head.”
“Among other things,” I said, “the Apaches wounded him, and then they shot him
full of splinters.” “But you killed him.”
“That’s right, I did.” Carefully, with several men standing about, I told him
what had happened that day. Some of it I’d told him before, back in the Shoo-Fly
when he told me about Kahtenny.
“He begged me to shoot him. Under the same situation I’d have done the same,
more than likely.”
“Perhaps.” Lewiston looked hard at me. “Sackett, is it not true that your family
feuded for years with a family named Higgins? That you hunted each other and
killed each other on sight?”
“That was over years ago,” I said. “Anyway, I ain’t been back in that country
since the war. As for this Higgins, I never gave it no thought. It’s been a good
while since I’ve had any cause to think of it.”
“Nevertheless, Billy Higgins is dead, killed by your bullet. I have to warn you,
Sackett, the story is out, and there’s considerable feeling in Tucson. Higgins
had friends there.”
“But I tell you, I — ”
“Don’t tell me. Tell the jury.” He walked away from me, and I sat there by the
fire, a-staring into it. I’d run a long way. I’d fought some hard fights. I’d
stood off the Apaches and the Haddens, and now here I was, arrested for a crime
that was no crime, but a crime they could hang me for.
And there was only one person in Tucson likely to know about that old
Higgins-Sackett feud.
Laura Sackett …
Chapter 18
You can take it from me that no jail cell is a place for a mountain boy. I was
raised up where folks looked to the hills, only up where we came from you hadn’t
chance to look much higher, we were that near the top of the ridge.
This cell they put me into had one small window, too small for me to crawl out
of, and a door that was as barred as could be. When I heard that door clang shut
I wasn’t at all happy. Only thing I knew, I was going to catch up on my sleep,
and at least I could eat. And right about that time I was hungry enough to eat
an old saddle, stirrups and all.
Captain Lewiston was my first visitor. He came early in the morning, and brought
a chair into the cell with him. He also brought the company clerk.
“Sackett,” he began, “I want you to give me the whole story, in your own words.
I want to help you if I can. Right now the people are divided. Some want to hang
you for killing Billy Higgins, and some want to give you a medal for saving
those youngsters.”
So I gave it to him. How the bunch of us, unknown to each other until then, had
banded together to ride to Tucson.
The story of our fight with Kahtenny’s Apaches I repeated for him, as I’d told
him the whole story before, except the part about me killing Billy Higgins,
which I didn’t like to think on. Then I told him about my meeting with Laura
Sackett, and her story of the lost boy.
“This much I have learned since your departure,” Lewiston said. “Laura Sackett
was divorced from your brother, and your brothers and her father had been deadly
enemies.”
“If I ever heard of that, I’d forgotten. We Sacketts were never much on talking
of troubles when we were together. It never does any good to go worrying your
thoughts about things gone by.”
“I approached her last night about your story,” Captain Lewiston said. “She
denies ever mentioning a child to you, or giving you any cause to ride into
Mexico.”
I just looked at him. It was no use to say she was lying, although she surely
was.
“As a matter of fact, she says you ran away to Mexico for fear somebody would
discover you had taken advantage of an Apache attack to kill Higgins.”
“Those boys I was with knew better. Why else would they come with me?”
“I am afraid that won’t help you at all. I believe you told me that they are
dead.”
“I buried Rocca with my own hands. Spanish Murphy was finished off by the
Haddens. By their own say-so. John J…. well, I guess he never made it that
far.”
“You have no witnesses then?”
“No, sir. Nary a one. You see, Cap’n, none of those men saw it anyway. When I