Shalako (1962) (2 page)

Obviously, he knew nothing of the movement of the Apaches, and that implied that nobody else knew as yet. Wells was close to the Army and would be among the first to hear.

Shalako had backtrailed Wells for less than two miles when he came upon the trail Wells had lost.

Pausing briefly, Shalako tried to form a picture of the situation, for to follow a trail successfully it is first necessary to know something of the motives of the person followed.

Both horses were freshly shod, and both moved with an eagerness that implied they had come but a short distance.

Wells was no such tracker as Shalako, a fact Wells would have been the first to admit and, swinging a wide circle, Shalako picked up the lost trail in a matter of minutes.

What he found was merely a white scratch ... the scar of an iron shoe upon a rock.

Farther along a bit of stepped on sage, then a partial hoof track almost hidden by a creosote bush. The trail led toward the Hatchet Mountains and, judging by the crushed sage, it was no more than two hours old.

By the time, some thirty minutes later, that he was riding up the slope that led to the base of the Hatchets, he knew a good deal more about the person he was following.

He also knew why Wells had been following and that there was a fairly large camp in the vicinity.

In the first place, the rider was in no hurry, and was unfamiliar with the country.

As there were no inhabited ranches or mines in the area, this implied a camp close enough for the rider to return before dark.

Here and there the rider had paused to look more closely at things, interesting enough in themselves, but too familiar for a Western man to notice.

At one point the rider had attempted to pick the blossom from a prickly pear. The blossom lay where it had been hastily dropped. Shalako's face broke into a sudden grin that brought a surprising warmth to his bleak features.

Whoever plucked that blossom had a bunch of stickers in her fingers.

Her?

Yes, he was sure the rider was a girl or woman. The tracks of the horse, for example ... it was a horse of medium build with a good stride ... the tracks were but lightly pressed upon the sand, which implied a rider of no great weight.

Moreover, Pete Wells had been extremely anxious to find the rider, which also implied a woman about whom he was worried. He might have followed any tenderfoot, but a man like Wells, almost any Western man in fact, would have the feeling that whatever a man did was his own problem.

If a man was big enough to make his own tracks and carry a gun he was a responsible person, responsible for himself and his actions, and not to be pampered.

A man in the Western lands was as big as he wanted to be, and as good or as bad as he wished. What law existed was local law and it felt no responsibility for the actions of any man when they took place out of its immediate jurisdiction. There were very few border-line cases. Men were good and bad ... simply that ... the restrictions were few, the chances of concealment almost nonexistent. A man who was bad was boldly bad, and nobody sheltered or protected any man.

But this rider was a woman, of that Shalako was now sure.

The horse the woman rode was a mare ... back there a short way the rider had drawn up to look over the country and the mare took the occasion to respond to a call of nature ... from the position of her feet it was obvious she was a mare.

Men in the West rarely rode mares or stallions. There might be exceptions, but they were so scarce as to attract a good deal of attention. They rode geldings because they were less trouble among other horses.

Suddenly, almost in the shadow of the mountains, he saw where a trail of unshod ponies had crossed ahead of him. The rider he followed had noticed them also.

"One up for her," he said aloud. "At least she has her eyes open.

The rider had drawn up, the mare dancing nervously, eager to be moving.

Now he scored another mark for the rider... a tender foot and a woman, but no damned fool ... she had turned abruptly north and, skirting a nest of boulders, had entered a canyon. That last was not a good move but, obviously alarmed, she was seeking the quickest route back to camp.

The roan stumbled often now and Shalako drew rein beside the boulders and got down.

Pouring a little water into his bandanna, he squeezed the last drop into the roan's mouth. He did this several times, and was about to step back into the saddle when he heard a horse's hoof click on stone.

He swung his leg over the saddle, then stood in the stirrups to look over the top of the boulder.

Evidently the canyon had proved impassable or a dead end, for the rider was returning.

And the rider was a woman. Not only a woman, but a young woman, and a beautiful woman.

How long since he had seen a girl like that? Shalako watched her ride toward him, noting the ease with which she rode, the grace of manner, the immaculate clothing.

A lady, this one. She was from a world that he had almost forgotten... Bit by bit his memories had faded behind the blazing suns, the hot, still valleys, the raw-backed hills.

She rode a sorrel, and she rode sidesaddle, her gray riding skirt draped gracefully over the side of the mare, and she rode with the ease of long practice. Yet he was grimly pleased to see the businesslike way her rifle came up when he appeared from around the rock. He had no doubt that she would shoot if need be. Moreover, he suspected she would be a very good shot.

She drew up a dozen yards away, but if she was frightened there was no visible evidence of it.

"None of my business, but this here is Apache country."

So. "You know a man named Pete Wells?" "Yes. He's our wagon-master."

"Pete never did have much sense." He gathered his reins. "Lady, you'd better get back to your camp wherever it is and tell them to pack up and high-tail it out of here." "Why should I do a thing like that?"

"I think you've guessed," he said, "I think you had an idea when you saw those tracks back yonder." He gestured to indicate the mountains far behind him. Their near flank was shadowed now, but the crest carried a crown of gold from the sun's bright setting. "Over there in the Sierra Rica there's an Apache named Chato. He just rode up out of Mexico with a handful of warriors, and here and there some others are riding to meet him. He will soon be meeting with some more who have jumped their reservation, and within forty-eight hours there won't be a man or woman alive in this corner of New Mexico."

"We have been looking forward to meeting some Indians," she replied coolly. "Frederick has been hoping for a little brush with them."

"Your Frederick is a damned fool."

"I should advise you not to say that to him."

Shalako handed her his field glass. "Over east there. See that smoke? Over by the peak?"

"I see nothing." "Keep looking."

She moved the glass, searching against the far-off, purpling mountains. Suddenly, the glass ceased to move. "Oh? You mean that thin column of smoke?"

"It's a talking smoke ... the telegraph of the Apache. You and your outfit better light out fast. You already got one man killed."

"I ... what?"

"Pete was always a damn' fool, but even he should have known better than to bring a party of greenhorns into this country at a time like this."

Her cheeks paled. "Are you telling me that Pete Wells is dead?"

"We've sat here too long. Let's get out of here." "Why should I be responsible? I mean, if he is dead?" "He's dead, all right. If he hadn't been sky-lining himself on every hill while hunting for you he might not have been seen."

He led off along the base of the Hatchets, heading north. The gaunt land was softening with shadows, but was somehow increasingly lonely. The girl turned in her saddle to look toward the distant finger of smoke, and suddenly she shivered.

"We're at a ranch north of the range," she told him. "Mr. Wells took us there. The place is deserted."

"How'd you get in here past the troops?"

"Frederick did not want an official escort. He wished to see the Apache in battle."

"Any man who hunts Apache trouble is a child." Her tone was cool. "You do not understand.

Frederick is a soldier. He was a general in the Franco-Prussian War when he was twenty-five.

He was a national hero."

"We had one of those up north a few years back. His name was Custer."

Irritated by his amused contempt, she made no reply for several minutes yet, despite her anger with him, she was observant enough to note that he rode with caution, never ceased to listen, and his eyes were always busy. She had hunted before this, and her father had hunted, and she had seen the Masai hunt in Africa... they were like this man now.

"It is silly to think that naked savages could oppose modern weapons. Frederick is amused by all the trouble your Army seems to have."

He looked uneasily into the evening. There was a warning in the stillness. Like a wild thing he felt strange premonitions, haunting feelings of danger. He felt it now. Unknowingly he looked eastward toward the mountains, unknowingly because upon a ridge of those mountains an Apache looked westward ... miles lay between them.

Tats-ah-das-ay-go, the Quick Killer, Apache warrior feared even by his own people ... master of all the wiles, the deceits, the skills. He looked westward now, wondering.

At the no longer deserted ranch where the hunting party of Baron Frederick von Hallstatt built its cooking fires, a man beside one of the fires suddenly stood up and looked away from the fire.

He was a lean and savage man with a boy's soft beard along his jaws, high cheekbones, and a lantern jaw. His thin neck lifted from a greasy shirt collar, and he looked into the distance as if he had heard a sound out there. The .44 Colt on his thigh was a deadly thing.

Bosky Fulton was a gunman who had never heard of either Tats-ah-das-ay-go or Shalako Carlin. He did not know that his life was already bound inextricably to those two and to the girl Irina, whom he did know. Yet the night made him restless.

Back upon the desert, Shalako had drawn up in a cluster of ocotillo clumps and under their slight cover he studied the country around, choosing a way.

"Every Apache," he said conversationally, "knows all your Frederick knows about tactics before he is twelve, and they learn it the hard way. The desert is their field of operations and they know its every phase and condition. Every operation your Frederick learned in a book or on a blackboard they learned in battle. And they have no base to protect, no supply line to worry about."

"How do they eat?"

He swept a gesture at the surrounding desert. "You can't see them but there are a dozen food plants within sight, and a half dozen that are good for medicine."

The sun brushed the sky with reflected rose and with arrows of brightest gold. The serrated ridges caught belated glory... out upon the desert a quail called inquiringly.

She felt obliged to defend their attitude. "There are eight of us, and we are accompanied by four scouts or hunters, eight teamsters, two cooks, and two skinners. We have eight wagons."

"That explains something that's been bothering me. The Apaches started eating their horses two days ago." "Eating them?"

"Only thing an Apache likes better than horse meat is mule meat. He will ride a horse until it's half dead and, when they find a place where they can get more horses, they will eat those they have."

"You are implying they expect to have our horses?" The desert was too still, and it worried him. He got down from the saddle and rinsed his bandanna once more in the roan's mouth. As she watched him the girl's anger went out of her.

She looked at him again, surprised at the softness in his eyes and the gentleness with which he handled the horse.

"You love your horse."

"Horse is like a woman. Keep a strong hand on the bridle and pet 'em a mite and they'll stand up to most anything. Just let 'em get the bit in their teeth and they'll make themselves miserable and a man, too."

"Women are not animals." "Matter of viewpoint."

"Some women don't want a master."

"Those are the miserable ones. Carry their heads high and talk about independence.

Seems to me an independent woman is a lonely woman."

"You are independent, are you not?"

"Different sort of thing. The sooner women realize that men are different, the better off they'll be. The more independent a woman becomes the less of a woman she is, and the less of a woman she is the less she is of anything worth-while."

"I don't agree."

"Didn't figure on it. A woman shouldn't try to be like a man. Best she can be is a poor imitation and nobody wants anything but the genuine article.

"Nature intended woman to keep a home and a hearth. Man is a hunter, a rover... sometimes he has to go far afield to make a living, so it becomes his nature."

He kept his voice low and without thinking of it she had done the same.

"And where is your woman?" "Don't have one."