Apache Flame (3 page)

And as for exciting…schoolteachers weren’t allowed any
excitement. She was expected to be the epitome of decorum at all times. She had
to be careful of what she said, what she did, what she wore. She must never
utter a cross word, never do anything that could be construed as unladylike,
never wear bright colors, never rouge her cheeks or paint her lips. The fact
that she was also the preacher’s daughter only made things worse. She must be
outgoing and friendly at all times so as not to offend anyone. She must never
gossip, or listen to gossip, be careful of the company she kept, avoid even the
breath of scandal.

She heard the clock in the church tower chime the hour. Four
o’clock. She would have to hurry. Her father expected dinner on the table no
later than five.

But she wasn’t thinking about what to fix for dinner when
she reached home a few minutes later. Instead her mind was filled with memories
of the man she had thought never to see again, and what she would say to him
when, inevitably, they met face to face.

Chapter Two

Mitch Garret rode directly through the main part of town.
Canyon Creek had grown considerably in the years he’d been away. The old
mercantile owned by George Cox and his son was gone, and a new, two-story white
building with dark green shutters stood in its place. A new sign read
HALSTEAD’S
MERCANTILE. Aaron Halstead, Proprietor.
There was a new boardwalk, a new
hotel with a restaurant adjoining. Dixon’s Livery was wearing a new coat of
paint. He chuckled softly as he saw old Mr. West dozing in a rocker outside the
barber shop. Some things never changed.

He was aware of the curious stares that followed him, the
whispers, the speculation. He didn’t stop, didn’t look to the right or the
left, just kept riding down Front Street until he reached the narrow dirt road
that led to the winding creek that clearly divided the town, with the leading
citizens residing on the north side and the riffraff on the south. The creek
ran deep here, screened from the town by an overgrown mass of shrubs, weeds,
and berry bushes.

He had grown up in this town, held in derision not only
because of his Indian blood but because his father had worked in one of the
saloons, gambling away his pay as soon as he earned it so that there was never
enough money for new clothes, and sometimes not even enough to buy food.

Things had gotten a little better when Mitch turned
thirteen. When he hadn’t been at school, which he hated, or out hunting in
hopes of putting food on the table, Mitch had worked a couple hours a day at
the saloon, emptying spittoons, washing bar glasses, sweeping the raw plank
floor, unloading cases of whiskey from the back of the supply wagon that had
come through town every month or so. He had learned to play poker when other
kids his age were playing catch, downed his first shot of whiskey when the
other kids were still drinking milk.

Hat pulled low to shield his face from the drizzling rain,
he dismounted and made his way to the flat rock that jutted out over the creek.
It looked smaller, he thought, remembering the warm summer days he had spent on
that rock, basking in the sun with Alisha.

Alisha. A hard knot formed in his gut when he thought of her
married to a worm like Smithfield. He recalled the day he had stolen Alisha’s
lunch, the smug look on Smithfield’s face when he stood in front of the class
while old man Fontaine punished him. The tears in Alisha’s eyes. He wondered if
she still lived in town. She and Smithfield probably had three or four kids by
now, he mused, surprised that the thought of her having another man’s children
could still cause him pain.

Smithfield! Of all the men she might have married, why had
she chosen Roger? He recalled the day the two of them had come to blows. It had
been a long time coming, fueled by a mutual dislike, by snide remarks on both
sides, by threats and taunts and dares. It had all come to a head one day after
school when Smithfield called Mitch’s mother red trash in front of Alisha and a
half dozen other boys. It had been the last straw. He had laid into Smithfield
like a fox after a chicken. Surprisingly, Smithfield managed to give about as
good as he got until Mitch broke his nose. At the sight of blood flowing down
Smithfield’s face, one of the boys had run for old man Fontaine, who came out
and broke up the fight.

Smithfield had been chastised by old man Fontaine. Mitch had
been expelled for a week. He would have quit school then and there, but his
mother had insisted he go back.

Mitch peered through the tangled berry vines that screened
the rock from the path. He could just barely see the roof of the Faraday house.
He had never told Alisha, but he’d snuck into her house one Sunday morning when
her family was at church. It had been easy enough, since Reverend Faraday would
no more think of locking his front door any more than he’d think of locking his
church.

Mitch’s family had still been living in that tar paper shack
at the time and Mitch had been mightily impressed as he wandered through the
Faraday house.

The furniture had been clean, not stained with spilt liquor.
There had been colorful rugs on the floor, lacy white doilies on the tables,
photographs on the mantle and on the wall.

He had swiped an apple out of the kitchen, then gone
upstairs, curious to see ‘Lisha’s room. It had been just as he imagined, all
done in pink and white, with a ruffled coverlet on the bed and a rag rug on the
floor. A shelf held books. A porcelain doll sat in a small rocking chair in one
corner.

Standing on the rock, his hands shoved deep into his
pockets, Mitch turned and faced the north. The sprawling ranch house that his
father had won in an all-night poker game the year Mitch turned twelve stood at
the far end of town atop a lofty rise. The old man had moved them into it, but
Mitch’s mother had refused to stay there. After a few months, she had packed
her meager belongings and gone back to her own people. Mitch had wanted to go
with her, but the old man had refused to let him go. He had never figured out
why his father wouldn’t let him leave. Finally, he’d decided it was just his
father’s way of proving who was the boss. Mitch had run away several times, but
his father had come after him every time. Each beating he had received for
running away was more severe than the last, but it wasn’t until his father told
him that his mother had died of pneumonia that Mitch stopped running.

He blew out a breath. It was his house now, such as it was.
It could have been a nice spread, but his father had gambled away the cattle
and let the house go to hell.

Across the creek, huddled together beneath the lowering
clouds as if they were ashamed to stand alone, stood the ‘dobe and tar paper
shacks where the town’s poor lived. He wondered if the shack he’d been born in
was still standing.

Squatting on his heels, he listened to the raindrops as they
hit the water. How many times had he and Alisha come down here so they could be
alone? For the first time in years, he let himself remember…

Alisha begging old man Fontaine not to hit him for stealing
her lunch. He had always been hungry in those days. There hadn’t been a lot of
big game near the town, but rabbits had been plentiful. He grunted softly. He
hadn’t eaten rabbit since. The old man had taken the lion’s share of whatever
game Mitch brought home, taking it as if it was his due. Mitch had given his
share of the meat to his mother, taking little for himself. He pushed the
thought of his mother from his mind. It had been here that he had taught Alisha
how to swim, how to catch a rabbit and cook it, how to kiss…

Damn. He had kissed a lot of women since then, but he had
never forgotten the first time he kissed Alisha Faraday. He had always thought
of her as no more than a kid until that day.

Picking up a small stone, he tossed it into the creek,
watching the ripples fan out across the water.

His life had been like that, spreading out from this place.
He had run away, determined never to return, yet here he was, back where he’d
began. He tossed another rock into the river, then swung into the saddle and
rode toward the ranch. The old man was dead, or he never would have come back
here. He would settle the old man’s affairs, sell the house, and move on. If he
was lucky, it wouldn’t take more than a couple of days.

He snorted softly as he urged the big bay gelding into a
lope. When had he ever been lucky?

* * * * *

Mitch leaned forward in the saddle, his arms folded over the
pommel, as he regarded the house that was now his. The place hadn’t changed
much in the five years he’d been gone. There was still a hole in the roof of
the barn. The house still needed a coat of paint.

Swinging out of the saddle, he hitched his horse to the post
beside the front porch. Then, taking a deep breath, he climbed the three steps
to the porch, opened the big oak door, and entered the foyer.

He stood there a moment, feeling as though the weight of the
house was settling on his shoulders. He had never been happy here, never felt
as if he belonged. Old memories rose to the surface, echoing down the corridors
of his mind. He heard his father shouting at his mother, demanding that she
give up her “Injun ways and become respectable”. He heard her cries when his
father slapped her, heard his own voice, high-pitched and afraid, as he tried
to defend his mother from the old man’s fists. He had never told Alisha just
how bad things were at his house, how abusive the old man was when he was
drunk, or when he had lost at cards. To spare Alisha’s tender feelings and his
own pride, he had made light of the beatings he received, avoiding her company
when the bruises were fresh and ugly.

He remembered the day the old man had walked in and caught
his mother teaching him to speak Apache. He hadn’t been more than three or four
at the time, but it was a day he never forgot. With a roar, the old man had
grabbed his mother by the hair and slapped her, again and again, yelling all
the while, cursing at her for teaching his son Injun ways.

Later, when he was older, he wondered why his father had
married his mother if he hated the Indians so much. Wondered, but never found
the courage to ask.

He forced himself to go into the parlor. It was easy to see
why his mother, who had been a woman of light and laughter, had hated this
place. The walls were paneled in dark wood. The furniture was heavy,
upholstered in a dark brown fabric. Heavy dark green drapes covered the
windows.

The old man had hired a housekeeper to do the cooking and
cleaning after Mitch’s mother left. Mrs. North had been a sour-faced old crone
with iron-gray hair, pinched cheeks, close-set hazel eyes, and no sense of
humor. He had never heard her laugh, never seen her smile. She had insisted the
drapes be kept closed so that the sunlight didn’t fade the carpets and the
furniture. She refused to let him have his dog in the house, insisted he wash
before dinner and after dinner, that he bathe once a week. She had tried time
and again to make him cut his hair, but Mitch had flatly refused and for some
reason he had never understood, his father had backed him up.

Striding across the floor, Mitch flung the drapes aside.
Standing at the window, he watched the raindrops run down the glass. They
reminded him of the last time he had seen Alisha, reminded him of the tears
that had slid down her cheeks…

* * * * *

“Why are you leaving?” She looked up at him, tears
glistening in her eyes. “Where are you going?”

“I don’t know. I only know I’ve got to get out of here. Away
from this town. Away from him.”

“Away from me,” she murmured.

“‘Lisha.”

“Please don’t go.” Tears spilled from her eyes and ran down
her cheeks.

“I’ve got to. I can’t stay here any longer. I’ll kill him if
I do.”

Sobbing, she had locked her arms around his waist and held
on as if she would never let him go. He groaned softly as she squeezed his rib
cage. He didn’t want to leave her. It was the last thing he wanted. But he had
to get out of town, away from his old man. He couldn’t take anymore, knew with
a cold crystal clarity that if the old man hit him one more time, he would kill
him.

“I’ll send for you, as soon as I get settled somewhere.” He
slid his hand into her hair. “Will you come?”

She looked up at him, hope shining in her eyes. “You
promise, Mitchy?”

Mitchy. No one else had ever called him that. “I promise,
but it might take awhile.”

“I’ll wait,” she said, smiling through her tears. “However
long it takes. Forever, if I have to…”

* * * * *

Mitch grunted softly as he turned away from the window.
Apparently four months had been longer than forever. But times had been hard
back then, jobs scarce. He had finally found a job working on a cattle ranch in
Wyoming and once he was settled, he had written to Alisha, telling her to come
to him. He had sent her money and a train ticket. She had returned both, along
with a brief note that had said, in part, that she had reconsidered his offer
and had decided to marry Roger Smithfield instead.

He had left the ranch at summer’s end. Being a cowboy had
been hard work. Roundups, branding, long hours spent in the saddle. He quickly
came to the same conclusion as the other cowhands. Cattle had to be the
stupidest creatures the Good Lord had ever created, forever getting tangled up
in barbed wire or mired in bogs. The job had been bearable when he was doing it
so he and Alisha could be together. Without her, it had been just hard work.

For a time, he had drifted from place to place. He had been
a young man from a small town who’d been nowhere, seen nothing. An angry young
man with a broken heart. He had tried to forget her, tried to drown her memory
in booze, in the arms of other women. Nothing had worked but, in time, the ache
had grown less and he quit running. He had stopped in a little Colorado mining
town to spend a few days and ended up wearing a badge. He had stayed there for
almost three years before the itch to move on hit. During those three years,
the name Mitch Garret became a name to be reckoned with. The town had been wide
open when he pinned on a badge; it had been a quiet, law-abiding community when
he left, a place where decent folk would walk the streets without fear. He had
been in a Nevada saloon when he got word of his father’s death.