Whippoorwill (13 page)

Shirley buried her face in the sheet. She’d been forced to endure this private moment with an audience, and now, to have her womanly body belittled in such a manner was too much to endure.

“Get out!” she shrieked, and threw a shoe at Milt. “You, too,” she said, and hefted the other one at Art.

The brothers turned and ducked, heading for the door. Once outside they stopped and grinned.

“I think she was mad,” Art said.

Milt shrugged. “For a dollar, old Shirley can get in a real good mood.” Then his thoughts switched from one woman to the next as he fingered his gun. “Let’s go get that short-haired bitch. By gawd, she owes us big!”

Art strutted. He loved to be right. Later when it counted, he would remind old Milt that this had been his idea from the start.

***

Replete from her first food of the day and unaware of what was unfolding, Caitie wiped her hands on her pants as she headed back toward the livery. The empty feeling in the pit of her stomach was gone. And to her dismay, so was the horse at the far end of the stalls. Her heart lurched.

“Oh no! It’s for certain that Mr. Pevehouse will be firin’ me. Either it’s been heisted, or the owner’s gone off without the leavin’ of pay. Whichever it is, I’m done.”

While she was considering the benefits of making herself scarce, the lights went out. Before she could cry for help, someone stuffed a rag in her mouth and bagged her with an empty gunny sack like so much feed. Her feet went out from under her, and seconds later she felt them being tied. She was capable of nothing more than grunted curses and frantic squeals as a rope was tied around the sack, pinning her arms to her body and rendering her helpless to fight back. She heard an ugly snicker and kicked as hard as she could. When the toe of her boot connected on bone, she knew she’d hit a target. Someone groaned and then cursed and her heart almost stopped. That sounded like the Bolin Brothers!

Merciful God, I pray I’m not right.

But when one of the men suddenly grabbed at her crotch, she knew her worst fears were realized.

“By damn, Art, you were right. There ain’t nothing there but air.” Milt pinched her once, his laugh little more than a gurgle. “Make sure you get all of her stuff. They’ll think she went and stole a horse, then lit a shuck for parts unknown. We’ll be long gone before anyone knows different.”

Her stomach lurched, and it was all she could do to keep her egg and biscuit down. Bound and gagged as she was, if she threw up now, she’d choke on her own spit.

“Tie her on that horse,” Milt growled, and tossed Art the other end of the rope dangling from the girl’s body.

Art quickly complied. A few minutes later they rode out, using the back alleys to get to the edge of Mudhen Crossing.

Only one person saw them leave, and that was Boarding House Shirley. She was none too glad to see the backside of the Bolins and their horses, and paid no attention to what they were packing.

Caitie had been missing for more than an hour when Edward Pevehouse came back to the stables to find his employee gone, as well as a customer’s horse. Certain that the youth had committed a theft, he ran toward the sheriff’s office to make a report.

As he came up Main Street, Pevehouse saw the sheriff in front of the saloon with that gunslinger, Breed. He paused, but only briefly. Whatever they were discussing could not be as important as what he had to say.

“Sheriff! I say, Sheriff!” Fully aware of the imperious quality in his voice, he narrowed the distance between them, complaining with every step. “I want to report a crime.”

Bud Williams turned, staring intently at the portly man heading his way. “Well, hell,” he muttered.

Joe Redhawk grinned. “You’re the man who wanted this job.”

Bud rolled his eyes. “Why didn’t you just shoot me then and put me out of my misery?”

Joe’s grin widened.

Pevehouse gave Joe a look of dismissal with apologizing for his interruption.

“Sheriff! I want to report a crime.”

“What crime?” Bud asked.

“My stable boy has stolen a horse. I want a posse formed and I want him brought back and hanged.”

Bud frowned. He’d seen the kid around town and was vaguely surprised by the accusation.

“Are you sure it was him?” he asked. “Maybe he fell asleep on the job and someone just rode out without paying.”

“No! He’s missing, as are his belongings and one of my horses. I want a posse formed now.”

Joe was in doubt from the first words out of Pevehouse’s mouth, and the more the man talked, the angrier he became. He kept thinking of yesterday’s incident with the Bolin Brothers and suspected there was more to her disappearance than a stolen horse.

When Pevehouse finally paused to take a breath, Joe chose the moment to interrupt. “Hey, Bud. Before you go off half-cocked, you might want to check and see if Milt and Art Bolin are still in town.”

Bud looked surprised. “Why?”

“I ain’t tellin’ you how to do your job, but I pissed the Bolins off real big yesterday while they were in the act of trying to mess with the kid. Could be they decided they needed revenge.”

Pevehouse poked at the star on Bud William’s shirt. “Now see here, I helped put you in office. You can go out the same—”

Bud grabbed his finger, warning thick in his voice. “Don’t remind me. And I’ll do this my way,” he added. “If Joe thinks there’s more to this, I believe him.”

Pevehouse yanked his hand out of the sheriff’s grasp. “Damn half-breed. How can he know anything, when he doesn’t even know who his own father was?”

Joe’s hand was on his gun before he had time to think, but a quiet warning from Bud made him turn and walk away.

Bud frowned. When he could trust himself to talk without cursing the man, he gave Pevehouse a cold, blue stare.

“You know, Pevehouse, if you choose to judge a man by something as insignificant as his birth, then I guess in your eyes, Joe has an excuse. What the hell is yours?”

He left before Pevehouse could answer. The way he was feeling, it wasn’t safe to stay and say any more. He caught up with Joe at the hitching post where his horse was tied.

“Hey, Joe!”

Redhawk paused in the act of tightening the girth and looked up.

“Sorry about that,” Bud said.

Joe shrugged. His eyes were dark with anger, but his voice was low and even. “You got nothing to apologize for.”

“Then why are you leaving? I thought we were going hunting tonight.”

“I’m still gonna hunt. Just not for deer.”

Bud frowned. “What are you getting at?”

Joe swung a leg up and over his horse, sliding the toe of his boots in the stirrups and testing them for length. “That stable boy is no boy. She’s a girl.”

Bud’s mouth went slack. “The hell you say!”

Joe yanked his hat down low until nothing was visible but the lower half of his face. If his hunch was right, he’d be riding straight into a setting sun.

“If the Bolins have discovered her secret, she’s in for real trouble and I’ve got to find her. I walked away yesterday knowing I should have stayed. It don’t pay to think about what they’ll do to her.”

Bud paled and then turned red in anger. Mistreating a woman was something a real man did not abide. He shook his head in disbelief. “Are you sure she’s a girl?”

Joe grinned. “Since when have I missed something like that?”

He rode out at a trot. A few minutes later, he was galloping across the prairie with the memory of her face for company.

***

“Better untie her,” Art said. “She ain’t moved since you pulled her off that horse. What if she’s smothered?”

Milt grinned and spit. “Then it means she won’t fight none when I have my way with her, don’t it?”

Art blanched. It was his opinion that his brother was sick. Plumb sick.

“I still say you need to untie her.”

Milt grinned. “You untie her if you’re so damned worried.”

Art began to look nervous. “I cain’t untie nothing. My hands are too sore and swoll up.”

Milt frowned. “Next thing you’re gonna be telling me that I got to pull it out for you so you can take a pee.”

“Just shut the hell up and let her get some air,” Art said, then stomped toward the campfire. In his opinion, less danger lay in the darkness outside the fire. This girl was hell on wheels.

Their camp had been hasty, and as usual, poorly thought out. They’d made camp in a blind canyon. One way in. One way out. Just like the sack they’d put over Caitie’s head.

Caitie was laying on the ground right where they’d dumped her. She could hear Milt circling her sacked body like a dog circles a skunk. She bunched her muscles, waiting for the opportunity to strike.

Remembering the near-thrashing she’d given him yesterday, Milt wasn’t sure whether he wanted to let her go or just run like hell. In a flash of inspiration, he slashed the ropes around the sack that bound her arms to her body then jumped back on the defensive.

She didn’t move.

Game to go one step further, he grabbed for the sack and yanked. With two hard jerks, it came off.

Seemingly lifeless, she rolled onto her side, as limp as an old man’s cock.

Milt nudged her with the toe of his boot. She didn’t even moan. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and stared at the situation for a bit before he realized she was still bound and gagged. He bent down to cut the ropes from her ankles and wrists. They fell into the dirt with a plop and just as he started to untie the rag around her mouth, Art walked up behind him.

“Is she dead?”

Startled by the sound of his brother’s voice, Milt’s gaze shifted. It was the opportunity Caitie had been waiting for. She came up kicking and swinging, although her arms were so numb she had to look to see if she’d made a fist.

“Gawdalmighty!” Art shrieked, and started to run. He’d already had more than his share of this shorn witch.

“Get back here, you dog!” Milt yelled, and then went to his knees, retching from the damage her boot had done to his crotch and certain if he sneezed, his balls would come out his nose.

Art hollered at Milt from behind a bush. “Just let her go! For Gawd’s sake, let her go!”

“Hell no!” Milt said, then rolled on his back, his knees drawn up under his chin as he rocked in pain. “Shoot her before she gets away.”

Art shivered as he pulled his gun. He’d never shot at a woman before.

Caitie yanked at the rag covering her mouth then stumbled in the dark. As she did, she fell flat on her face. The swift taste of salt and a jolting pain was a good sign that she’d be sucking instead of chewing her meals for a while. Her tongue was on fire, but the fall saved her. Art’s shot went wild, whizzing over her head and hitting the tree in front of her with a splat. The gunshot echoed within the canyon walls.

She was long gone before the last echo died.

THERE ARE NONE SO BLIND AS THOSE WHO WILL NOT SEE

Sunrise came without warning. One minute Caitie was walking through grass and trees with moonlight for a guide, and the next thing she knew, the sun was in her eyes. It was the first time since her escape that she’d known what direction she was going.

And while one direction was as good as another so long as the Bolins were somewhere else, Caitie would rather not have been in full view of the world with no place to hide. She paused on a rise and shaded her eyes with her hand, squinting them just enough against the new sun to get her bearings.

To her left, a low line of blue-gray mountains broke the flat horizon. The distance, she knew, was deceiving. It would take days to reach the foothills. With no food or water, that way was out of the question. To her right, the ground rolled before her, falling away into an undulating sea of grass. A black mass moved upon it like a shadow upon the land. Caitie’s heart leaped in her breast at the buffalo ranging as far as the eye could see! She’d seen them before, but safely from the seat of a wagon. She didn’t want to be on foot anywhere near a herd that size.

That left two options. What was before her and what lay behind. She’d escaped the Bolins twice now. Once, thanks to a gun-slinger with a sense of fair play, and the second time, pure luck. Having another run-in with them was more than she cared to try.

Caitie looked intently at the landscape before her. The unknown held new appeal. Without hesitation, she started forward. The sun cooked her face, burning her eyes and her lips, which only added to the misery of an empty belly, and still she walked.

It was hours later before she would top a rise that gave her hope. Legs shaking from exertion and hunger, she paused at the crest of a hill and looked down at the valley below. Trees dotted the landscape. Beyond the tops of the farthest trees, Caitie thought she saw…

“Water! Blessed Jesus, tis water!”

She crossed herself out of habit although she’d long since given up counting on anybody but herself, and started forward at a brisk walk. The impetus of moving downhill shifted the walk to a trot, and by the time she’d gained the level floor of the valley, Caitie O’Shea was in an all-out run. Still several hundred yards from the river, the smell of the water was already in her nose.

***

Eyes Like Mole saw the white man. Several hundred yards away. Running toward him like a madman. And man is what he thought Caitie to be. His misconception rested upon the fact that she wore the pants of a white man and had chopped off her hair to match, but the closer she came, the more nervous he got.

At a distance, his vision was fine. From where he sat upon his horse, he could see for miles in every direction. But up close to his prey—or his enemies—where survival often counted the most—navigation was accomplished with a combination of blurry images and keen ears, and the fact that his horse knew the way home. Eyes Like Mole couldn’t see his hand in front of his face.

A squat man of little import within his people, the Arapaho, Eyes Like Mole had yet to take a wife when some of his friends had already taken a second. For the last three days he’d been on a vision quest, fasting and meditating, hoping that during his cleansing, the spirits of his ancestors would guide him on the right path. Now he wondered what this intrusion would mean. So he sat and he watched, even though the sun was hot upon his bare shoulders and sweat ran beneath his deerskin leggings and down into his moccasins. It did not matter. Soon a breeze would come by and he would be cool. Personal comfort was a small thing to consider for a man who could not see all that he should.