Night Flower (Gone-to-Texas Trilogy) (38 page)

      
Blaine nodded in resignation. It was obvious that he still didn't like it.

      
When Lame Deer returned to where his burro had been tied, the recalcitrant animal was nowhere to be seen. Francisco had a habit of pulling his reins free and taking off for home. But Lame Deer was miles from San Antonio and he had very urgent news to give Melanie. Those evil men must be stopped! Delaying only long enough to retrieve his shirt, headband, and necklace, he started out in a slow, dogged trot for town. With every step he cursed Francisco; with every other one he asked forgiveness. If he were lucky, he could make it to town by daybreak the next day.
Pray God I am in time!

      
The sun was over the horizon when a sweat-soaked and panting Lame Deer staggered into town. His clothes were torn and his moccasins shredded. Impervious to his pain, he headed with single-minded purpose to the
Star
. Finding no one there, he crumpled tearfully against the locked door of the newspaper office, trying to decide on his next course of action. Exhaustion fogged his brain as he struggled to stay awake. Who else could he trust?

      
As if in answer to his question, a familiar big blue roan came loping up the street with Lee Velasquez seated on his back. Lame Deer struggled down from the newspaper’s porch and ran out into the street.

      
Before he could get enough wind to call out, Lee saw him and trotted his mount quickly to the boy. Dismounting, he grabbed the child angrily and asked, ‘‘Where the hell have you been? Your mother, Melanie, Father Gus, Wash Oakley—half of San Antonio's out searching for you! That burro came in late yesterday without you.”

      
“Francisco ran off while I was at Blaine's trading post. I had to run back to town,” the boy gasped out.

      
Looking at the child's feet, Lee could see the boy was telling the truth. “Why were you at Blaine's?”

      
“I was to tell Melanie, but I suppose since you are her husband, it is all right to tell you...,” he began uncertainly. At Lee's impatient nod, he spilled out the story of the raid on the Broughton ranch north of town while Walkman decoyed the rangers to the south.

      
Scooping up the exhausted, injured child, Lee swiftly remounted Sangre and headed for Father Gus's school. First, he must get some attention for the child, then find Jeremy Lawrence—if it wasn't already too late!

Chapter Nineteen

      
After spending a terrifying morning searching in vain for Lame Deer, Melanie returned to town, praying that someone had located the lost boy.
If only I hadn't encouraged him to spy on Walkman and Blaine,
she berated herself. She had ridden all the way to the trading post, but there was no trace of the child. Forcing down her fears that the cutthroats might have killed the boy, she rode up to Father Gus's school.

      
As soon as she saw the beaming expression on the padre's face when he emerged from the adobe, she knew Lame Deer was all right. “Where is he? Oh, Father Gus, is he injured?” She leaped from her horse and flew past the priest, who followed her into the dim interior of the building.

      
“He is unharmed. Francisco was at fault, but fortunate we were that his rider could walk home—even if it took all the night. He sleeps now. The Abbess fed him enough to fill a man her husband's size,” Father Gus said with a twinkle. Giving Obedience the nickname of “Abbess” seemed to amuse the young priest a great deal.

      
Quieting her overwrought emotions, Melanie tiptoed into the back room where the child slept on a small pallet. At once she saw the ugly bruises and cuts that disfigured his sweet face.

      
Gasping, she turned and whispered to Father Gus, “I thought you said he wasn't harmed! It looks as if someone beat him unmercifully.”

      
After he escorted her from the room, he explained, “The marks you see he did not receive yesterday, but a couple of days earlier. They are healing well.”

      
“Who did such a thing to this child?” she asked, fury rising at the bigotry she knew was responsible.

      
Father Gus threw up his hands in despair, “Felipe and Alfredo Rojas, I fear.”

      
“They're older, not to mention twice his size!”

      
“That I pointed out to them when I gave them several days' worth of penance in church,” he replied gravely. “Your husband it was who rescued the boy and brought him to me for care.”

      
Her eyes blazed in recognition. “So that's why he sent those books to you the next day!”

      
“He has much bitterness in his heart for past wrongs done him, but he is a good man, Melanie,” the priest said simply.

      
Her expression became guarded and she looked down, unable to meet his clear, penetrating gaze. “Well, I suppose even Lee Velasquez could show kindness to an Indian child.”
But not a woman with Indian blood.

      
“Yes, even more, he brought the boy to me this morning when he found him outside the newspaper office. I think the two of them will become friends. It is a good beginning,
ja
?”

      
“Where is Lee now, Father Gus?” Melanie's face reflected her puzzlement. If he had encountered the child at the
Star
before Clarence arrived, Lee must have returned to the ranch; yet she had not met him on the road.

      
Now, it was his turn to evade her searching look. “Well, Lame Deer had some news about renegade Comanches. Lee and the ranger Jeremy Lawrence rode out with a group of volunteers. That was after he left the child in my care.”

      
“Where did they go?” she shot back, her reporter's instincts once more alerted.

      
Recalling the promise he'd made to Lee, Father Gus shrugged. “Hours have passed, and it is a very dangerous thing they do—going after raiding Comanches.”

      
She sighed, realizing there was no way she could catch up with them, even if she knew where they'd gone. It was well after noon now. All she could do was wait until they returned.

      
When her attempts to get Father Gus to divulge more details about the renegades failed, Melanie asked the priest to explain about the fight between Lame Deer and the Rojas boys.

      
Wanting to take her mind off more dangerous pursuits, the young priest described the incident, including his rather unsettling confrontation with the culprits at confession the next day. “Although they made an act of contrition, I fear they do not truly repent for attacking an Indian,” he concluded sadly.

      
Melanie's eyes blazed contemptuously. “Of course not. They're the sons of an old aristocratic Hispanic family. Indians are just trash to them.”
And to Lee...

* * * *

      
They were too late. Lee knew it as soon as he smelled the smoke, not hot and heavy as if still freshly burning; but faint and musty, from last night. He could detect those old familiar smells before any of the other men.
Why not? God knows, I saw enough butchering in the
Apachería
for ten lifetimes.

      
When they crested a ridge and looked down at what had been the Broughton place, it was in ashes—house, barn, corrals. All the stock had been driven off. He knew what they'd find and he loathed seeing the carnage yet another time. With a sick knot of dread tightly coiled in his gut, Lee rode ahead of Lawrence and the others. Since Walkman had taken many of the more seasoned rangers on his decoy chase to the south, the men with Lawrence were mostly green. He hoped they wouldn't puke when they found the women. But he prayed they would find them. If they're here, they died quicker. If they had been taken by Gall and his raiders, Lee well knew what that meant and forced the thought from his mind.

      
The trail was useless to follow. Broughton’s livestock had been split into small bunches and driven in various directions, doubtless to rendezvous at some distant point, days hence. Without spare horses and provisions, there was no way the volunteers could pursue the killers.

      
“You see why Jim and I need your help, Velasquez?” Jeremy asked in a tight voice as they watched two silent men wrap Mrs. Broughton's remains in a blanket.

      
“Yeah, Lawrence, I see, and I said I'd do it,” Lee replied, turning sharply on his heel and reaching for Sangre's reins.

      
On the ride back to San Antonio, Lee battled with long-dead memories, forcing the savagery he'd just witnessed from his mind, refusing to dwell on similar incidents committed again and again by reds and whites in New Mexico and Chihuahua when he had ridden with Raoul Fouqué.

      
Unbidden, images of Melanie flashed into his mind as he battled his ghosts silently: Melanie, with her hair spread like a black satin mantle across her shoulders, her gold-coin eyes wide and fathomless; Melanie, who had unearthed the deadly link between Walkman and the savages. Damn her for endangering herself!

      
It was nearly dusk when Lee and the others reached San Antonio. If she'd gone home, he would check with Father Gus about Lame Deer and then ride for Night Flower; but he suspected Melanie was still in town waiting for the militia to return. Did she fear for him—or for Lawrence?

      
As if he'd conjured her up, Melanie came flying down the street as soon as the men reached the Main Plaza. A crowd had gathered, hearing of the raid at the Broughton place. As Jeremy's rangers and the other volunteers dismounted and dispersed, talking with various townsmen, Melanie sought out Lee.

      
Quickly, scanning his closed, set features, she concluded he was angry with her for remaining in town. “Lame Deer told me all about Gall's raid when he awakened this afternoon. Were your rangers in time?” Her face was earnest as she awaited a reply.

      
“They're not
my
rangers,” he said, biting off each word. “And, no, we weren't in time. Now let's go home.” He reached for her arm and tried to propel her away from the angry, shouting crowd that had gathered to hear the grisly tale of the volunteers.

      
“Let me go,” she gritted, shaking free of his proprietary grasp. “I intend to get the story for the
Star
. If you won't give it to me, maybe Jeremy will.”

      
If anything she said could have been more designed to provoke him, he was damned if he could think what it might be. “Jeremy,” he sneered, “is busy talking with the mayor. But if you're so interested in the ghoulish details, let me recount them for you. Pity we already buried the poor bastards, but I suppose you'd even exhume them if you thought it would get your name at the top of the story!”

      
“There's no need to be abusive, Lee. I want the facts for the
Star,
not to satisfy some ‘ghoulish’ curiosity,” she said furiously.

      
“You want the facts? I'll give you the facts. Seven people were murdered. Three of them children, one a baby. Broughton and his cowhands were killed pretty quick, by the looks of it—before they could protect Mrs. Broughton and her children. The baby's head was smashed open on a rock. Their twelve-year-old daughter was raped repeatedly before they cut her throat. So was Mrs. Broughton, after they sliced off her breasts—”

      
“Stop it,” she hissed through clenched teeth. Her face paled and the breath squeezed from her lungs in horror.

      
When she turned to stumble away from him, he caught up with her in one long stride, turning her roughly around and holding her at arm's length.

      
“You and your damn crusading over noble red men! Maybe now you'll give up your stupid meddling and stay home,” he rasped out.

      
“Stay home and do what? At least here in town I have a job. There's nothing for me at Night Flower, and you know it, Lee!” she replied bitterly.

      
He released her just as Clarence Pemberton emerged from the crowd, notebook in hand. Observing the exchange between the young couple, the old editor walked purposefully toward them. “I just talked with Jeremy Lawrence and have the pertinent facts, Melanie. I daresay it's been a long day for you both, Velasquez. Why don't you take your bride home?” At Melanie's murderous look, he continued unperturbed, “I believe I have everything here under control until morning.” With that curt dismissal, he turned and stalked toward another cluster of men who were discussing the militia's grisly report.

      
Melanie stomped toward the livery where she had stabled Liberator, her beloved stallion, brought by her parents on their ill-fated visit last month. Lee walked in angry counter step, leading Sangre. They rode home in silence, both grappling with their own particular demons. All she could think of was that he equated her with those renegades. Having Indian blood was a taint, a stain that placed an individual barely a step away from the savagery exhibited at the Broughton place last night.

      
By the time they arrived home and shared a light, cold repast in stony silence, Melanie was exhausted. After dinner she retired to her room, where she quickly slipped off her clothes and sank gratefully into the tub Genia had prepared for her. After almost falling asleep in the water, she roused herself enough to slip on a silk night rail and climb between the cool sheets in her lonely bed. There sleep claimed her at once.

      
Down the hall, Lee paced, unwilling to give in to the aching exhaustion and lie down. Visions of Melanie in her bath danced through his head. He heard the splash of water from her tub and Genia's low murmur as she bid the mistress good night. He could almost feel his wife's velvety skin, slick with bath oil, see her glistening and golden in the candlelight, smell the fragrance of night flowers that always seemed to cling to her.