When he was well away from even the smallest sounds of the camp he paused and began to sift the night-movements with his ears. A branch rubbing against another, leaves rustling, something, a bird or squirrel or rabbit, maybe, rustling a nest into the leaves. He listened and decided all was well here, but then he moved on, walking on cat feet.
The stars were out but clouds were scattered. There was a high wind tonight. He was up wind of their camp, testing for smoke. There was none.
That did not mean there was no cause to worry. The Shabbitt outfit might be very close and lying quiet. He looked back toward the camp, but could see nothing. The place was hidden, and approaching it would be difficult because of the enormous number of fallen trees from the blowdown. New trees had grown up, some of them towering up to forty to fifty feet, but the old trunks lay in a maze. Even by daylight a horseman could not penetrate that barrier, nor could a man on foot move with any speed.
Gloomily, he stared down the long meadow, gray in the starlight. Something moved down there.
A vague movement… bear, maybe.
He stood still, waiting. Duncan McKaskel ought to go back to that cabin. That was a right nice place… water close by, and meadows for cattle. There were beaver in those ponds and where there was beaver there were fish, and all manner of wild life. Elk favored aspens, and there were aspens aplenty around that cabin.
No more movement down there… the wind was from him toward the lower end of the meadow and if it was a bear or elk they had his scent by now.
Why was he here, anyway? What did he want with those eastern folks? They were no kin. He hadn’t never seen them until he drank their coffee that morning… it was good coffee, all right.
He looked away from the end of the meadow, letting the corner of his eyes hold sight of it. The corners of the eyes were sometimes better for locating movement.
Yes… there was something down there. Maybe fifty yards off… no, it would be further. His ears caught no sound but whatever was down there was coming closer.
His clothing was neutral in color, his body would fade into the trees behind him, so he waited. His fingers went to the Bowie. It was a good weapon at night, and a shot might bring that whole outfit down on him. Anyway, it might be an animal… only he no longer believed that.
He waited, unmoving yet prepared. Whoever approached was coming along as silently as he himself had moved. Was it the Huron? Con crouched low, trying to hear any slightest movement in the grass, remembering his father’s stories of the Iroquois, deadly enemy of the Huron Indians, and how they had decimated the Iroquois in the battles that followed the arrival of the French.
Con Vallian listened straining all his attention to hear. He had met the Huron only once, and had nearly lost his life. But this time-
There was a whisper of feet in the grass, a sudden rush from the night, starlight on a blade.
He threw himself to one side and felt the cold steel of the blade as it grazed him. His rifle in his left hand, he hit low and hard and up with the blade. It struck, something ripped and then he was hit hard on the shoulder. He rolled back, throwing up his feet to catch the Huron as he dove at him. His feet churned, smashing hard into his attacker’s face, and then he was up, swinging his rifle with both hands.
It hit nothing but empty air. He dropped, groping for his fallen knife, and then he moved swiftly, silently off to his left, holding the rifle before him like a sword to guard off a sudden attack. Again the rush of feet. He dropped to his knees and the Huron spilled over him. He thrust hard with his knife again and again… nothing.
Dammit, where was the man? Even as the thought flickered in his consciousness, a shadow loomed before him, striking his rifle aside, lunging at him again.
Vallian struck the side of the attacker’s head with his fist. He felt the Huron stagger under the blow. He struck again, but the Indian was gone. Crouching, gasping for breath, Vallian waited, every sense alert, for the next attack.
He waited, then slowly straightened up.
All was still. Overhead were the stars in a vast and empty sky. The wind stirred the grass and the aspen leaves whispered mysterious sounds. Slowly his breathing slowed. The Huron-and it had surely been he-was gone.
Dropping to one knee he felt for his rifle and found it, then got up slowly.
“Damn!” he whispered softly. “Dammit to Hell!”
For the first time in his life he wanted to kill a man, and for the first time in a long while, he knew he was afraid.
CHAPTER XV
When Con Vallian moved off into the night, Susanna listened to the faint sounds that lasted only as long as there was a shadow of him, and then they stilled. He was gone.
Duncan had finished his broth, and fallen asleep. Once, when he started to move, he moaned softly, and she felt fear go through her like a chill.
What if he had been injured internally? He had taken a bad fall, and would be relatively helpless for a time. What if she should be left alone here, with Tom?
It was a frightening thought. She was independent of mind but Duncan had always been there, as her father before him. Without him, in this wilderness, what could she do?
Her independence, she suddenly realized, had not in fact been independence at all, for she had depended on the law, on society, on all those things that gave her freedom and entitled her to respect. And out here there was none of that. Out here she was alone.
The firelight moved weird witch-shadows against the darkness, and a soft wind came through the leaves, fluttering the fire. Duncan muttered in his sleep, and she glanced to where Tom lay. He was also asleep, curled against the faint chill.
Susanna added sticks to the fire, then looked again to the shotgun. There were two shells in the barrels and she had two more in her pockets. It was little enough. They had left everything back at the cabin. What if it was destroyed? Duncan had only a little money.
She looked into the fire, loving the warmth and the hot coals that now lay in its bed. Fortunately there was no end of fuel.
Something stirred in the forest and she felt the skin prickle along the back of her neck. She glanced toward the shotgun. It was over there, out of reach… how could she be such a fool? Con Vallian never moved without his rifle. It was almost an extension of himself, and now she knew why.
She straightened up from the fire, adding a few sticks, as she did so, then she drew her shoulders together as if experiencing a chill. She went to the blankets as if to pick up her coat. Instead she took up the shotgun and turned.
A man was standing at the edge of the firelight. It was the dark man in the buckskin jacket, the one who had been with the flat-nosed man at the cabin.
“How do you do?” she said quietly. “Is there something I can do for you?”
His eyes went from her to the man. “He is not well?”
“Yes, he has been hurt. A lion jumped on his horse. He was thrown.”
“That was very clever… with the shotgun.”
“I am learning.”
He laughed, suddenly, pleasantly. “Yes… yes, I think you are.”
“Who is he? That other man?”
“A friend. He has been very helpful.”
The Huron came a step further. “Who is he? I must know.”
There was a deep cut on the Huron’s cheekbone, and his buckskin jacket had been slashed.
“Are you hurt? Your face seems to be cut.”
“It is nothing. Tell me who he is.”
“His name is Con Vallian.”
“Ahh!” The sound was a sudden, sharp exhalation, startling in its intensity. “You tell him this for me, that next time I shall kill him.”
“Why? Why should you kill him? Or anybody? Isn’t that rather savage?”
He turned his attention to her. “I am a savage. I am the Huron.”
“I do not think you are a savage. When you came to the cabin it was you who spoke for me. That man… the other man. If you had not spoken there might have been trouble.”
“Red Hyle would have killed him. He has spoken for you.”
“He has? You may tell Mr. Hyle that I am married, happily married.”