Wilderness Giant Edition 6 Page 5

  Jasper Flynt feinted, rotated, and slashed at Nate’s leg. Nate parried, their blades ringing. Hooking a foot behind Flynt’s ankle, Nate slammed his shoulder into his foe’s. Down Flynt tumbled, but he regained his footing with pantherish swiftness.

  Nate had met some hotheads in his time, but Flynt had them beat all hollow. The man had the disposition of a grizzly. He was one of those who seemed to think they had the God-given right to abuse others as they saw fit. No amount of talk or reasoning ever appealed to their better natures, because they had none. They were as dead inside as tombs, save for bitterness and spite that ate at them like a million gnawing termites.

  A swipe of Flynt’s glittering blade reminded Nate not to let his mind drift. Blocking, he pivoted on the balls of his feet and speared his knife at Flynt’s neck. By a hair, Flynt evaded the blow.

  Nate retreated, pretended to go left but went right. His hand flicked, drawing blood.

  Jasper Flynt cursed, scarlet drops falling from the gash in his right wrist. “Damn it!” he said. “I’m through going easy on you!” Bellowing, he unleashed a flurry of cuts and swipes that drove Nate backward.

  There was no denying Flynt was a skilled knife fighter. Nate was hard-pressed to stay out of his reach. The clang of their blades was like the ring of hail on tin. They stabbed, parried, hacked, and countered.

  Nate held his own while slowly backing up. He aimed to make Flynt tire himself out, then finish it quickly. But he made a mistake that became apparent when Maria Varga cried out.

  “Behind you, señor! The fire!”

  At the same instant Nate felt searing heat on the backs of his legs. He tried to leap to the left, but Flynt anticipated the move. A foot caught him in the stomach, toppling him. Flames licked his back and shoulders as he crashed down on top of the burning logs.

  One of the women screamed.

  Shakespeare McNair’s knuckles grew white where they gripped the cup. He was mightily tempted to step in, but by an iron effort of will he did not. Meddling was forbidden. Yet it tore at his innards to see the man he loved like a son suffer. He would rather chop off a hand or foot than have harm come to Nate King.

  Jasper Flynt sensed victory. Agleam with triumph, he hiked his blade overhead, then brought it sweeping down.

  Nate flipped to the right, gritting against the pain in his back and shoulders. He smelled burnt buckskin as he heaved up off the grass. Ducking under a swing that would have opened his neck to the bone, he lanced his long blade at Flynt’s ribs.

  Flynt twisted, but he was a shade slow. Breath hissed from between his teeth as the knife bit into his flesh. Clutching the wound, he propelled himself backward, into the ring of vaqueros. A burly man in a high-crowned brown hat gave him a shove. Flynt stumbled forward, tripping over his own two feet. Frantically, he sliced at Nate King to ward him off.

  Nate met the blade with his own. Simultaneously, he levered his left fist up and in, throwing his entire weight into a punch that lifted Jasper Flynt off the ground and dumped him like a broken doll in a disjointed heap.

  Flynt tried to rise. Eyelids fluttering, he gained his elbows but could go no higher. Drooling blood, he collapsed.

  “Finish him, señor!” a man shouted.

  Nate stood over the prostrate form, chest heaving, his knife poised. All it would take was a single stroke and the deed would be done.

  “No,” Shakespeare said simply.

  Every sinew taut, Nate looked at his mentor. “He would do the same to me.”

  “More of him anon,” Shakespeare quoted. “There is written in your brow, provost, honesty and constancy. If I read it not truly, my ancient skill beguiles me. But, the boldness of my cunning, I will lay myself in hazard.” He paused. “To put it more plainly, you are not him.”

  “If I let Flynt live, what’s to stop him from hunting me down later to get revenge?”

  “Not a thing,” Shakespeare admitted. “’Tis called the evil.” Taking a long sip, he smacked his lips. “But kill him now, son, in cold blood, and you won’t be able to live with yourself the rest of your days. Like Macbeth, you’ll be a haunted man, soiled by your own baser urges.” McNair locked eyes with the younger man. “You’re nobler than that, good Horatio.”

  Against his better judgment, Nate lowered his arms and sheathed his blade. “Sometimes you see more in me than I see myself.”

  “Well, I am not of that feather to shake off any friend when he must need me,” Shakespeare said.

  “You win.” Leaning over, Nate plucked Flynt’s knife from the man’s limp fingers.

  Ignacio Varga stepped forward. “That is all you are going to do, Americano? What manner of man are you that you allow his insult to pass unpunished? No Castilian worthy of the name ever would.”

  “Be quiet, son,” Don Varga said quietly. “There are times when it takes more courage not to kill than to kill.”

  “My pardon, Father, but you speak in riddles,” Ignacio said in disgust.

  Nate sat on a crate and gratefully accepted another cup of coffee from Rosa, returning her friendly smile of encouragement. Some of Varga’s many followers were whispering and pointing at him, their disappointment as keen as Ignacio’s.

  Don Varga barked words in Spanish. The burly man who had shoved Flynt came forward bearing a water skin, which he opened and tilted over Flynt. The man laughed when the frontiersman gurgled and sputtered and then sat up, panting.

  “You have overstepped your bounds, señor,” Don Varga said sternly. “I demand an immediate apology.”

  Gingerly touching his jaw, Flynt worked it from side to side.

  “Did you hear me?”

  Flynt nodded curtly. “My ears work just fine,” he muttered. “Quit flappin’ your gums, old man. I’ve had it with your uppity airs.”

  Don Varga’s anger increased, his spine as straight as a broom handle. “What are you saying?”

  “I quit this outfit,” Flynt stated, standing and glaring at Nate. “I’m packin’ my things and headin’ back to St. Louis. From here on out, you’re on your own.”

  Don Varga flung a hand out. “But you know we cannot find it without your help.” He put a hand on the frontiersman’s shoulder. “Remember, you gave your word to see this through. I even gave you some of the money in advance.”

  “Which I left for safekeepin’ back in St. Louis,” Flynt said smugly. Brusquely brushing Varga’s hand off, he pointed at the Rockies. “The way I see it, I’ve brought you almost the whole way. So I’ve more than earned what you gave me.”

  “Señor McNair was right. You are a scoundrel.”

  A crafty gleam came into Flynt’s eyes. “Don’t be so quick to judge, mister. I might be persuaded to change my mind.”

  “For what? More money?”

  Flynt hooked his thumbs under his belt. “No. The money ain’t all that important.” Lips quirking upward, he regarded Nate as a serpent might a mouse. “I want to stake this bastard out, skin him alive, and leave him for the coyotes and buzzards to finish off. If his partner McNair raises a fuss, we’ll do the same to him.”

  Don Varga was genuinely shocked. “I would never stand for such an atrocity! You are insane.”

  “Not at all,” Flynt said. “It’s how we do things in these parts, Spaniard. But I guess you’ll find that out the hard way.” So saying, he ambled toward the horses.

  Shakespeare finished the last of his coffee, his brow puckered. Jasper Flynt was as prickly as a cactus, but Flynt hadn’t lived as long as he had by being stupid. And striking off by his lonesome to the Mississippi was just that. Something was not quite right here, but he could not figure out what.

  Nate was glad to see the hothead leave. He felt no qualms, since Flynt had brought it on himself. As he raised the silver cup, Maria Varga materialized at his elbow.

  “Magnifico, señor.”

  “Ma’am?”

  “Your fight with Señor Flynt. You are extremely adept with a blade.”

  “Seen a lot of knife fights, have y
ou?” Nate asked, amused.

  “Si, señor. Castilian men are very hot-blooded. It does not take much to provoke them.” Her gaze darted to her older brother. “Ignacio is widely regarded as one of the best in all of Spain. Knife, dagger, sword, rapier, he is a master of each.”

  “I’ll be sure to remember that.”

  Swirling her hips, Maria rejoined her sisters. Over her slim shoulder she cast an impish, flirtatious grin, and winked. Nate was so startled that he gaped, forgetting his manners. She could not possibly be hinting at what he thought she was hinting at.

  Ignacio and Martin were arguing with their father in Spanish, but they stopped when Nate set down his cup and stood. “If we’re to make it back by evening,” he said to McNair, “we’d better head out now.”

  “I reckon so,” Shakespeare agreed, although he would not have minded another five or six cups of Rosa’s delicious coffee. In his estimation sugar had to be the greatest invention since the wheel.

  Don Varga walked them to their mounts. Warmly clasping Nate’s hand, he said, “I am most sorry for what happened. Please do not hold it against us. We look forward to meeting your families.”

  “We’ll be here.” Nate swung onto the stallion and prodded it westward. He hoped to high heaven that he was not making a mistake. The Vargas seemed friendly enough. Why, then, was he reminded of the time his parents took him to Rickett’s Circus in Philadelphia? Why, then, did he feel like the lion tamer about to stick his head into the fang-filled maw of the king of beasts?

  Five

  The mountain men were two miles up into the foothills when Shakespeare McNair spied four forms winding down toward them along the same trail. He was in the lead, rounding a bend. Reining instantly to the right, he rode in among a cluster of boulders and stopped.

  Nate King had been deep in thought. Over and over he had reviewed the sequence of events since the mysterious attack on his cabin, trying to make sense of the whole situation. He knew too little, he concluded, to come up with any answers.

  When his mentor angled off the trail, Nate mechanically did likewise. “What’s the matter?” he asked, halting the stallion next to the mare.

  “If you’d been paying attention, you’d know,” Shakespeare scolded while dismounting. “Haven’t I taught you that the only place you can let your guard down is in your own cabin?”

  “I counted on you to keep watch for both of us,” Nate quipped, which was a mistake in itself. In the wilderness, every man had to accept full responsibility for his own welfare. Others couldn’t be expected to nursemaid him. Each man’s hide was his own account.

  Shakespeare did not make an issue of the lapse. Moving to a low boulder close to the bend, he hunkered to check his Hawken. The four men he had seen coming toward them might be members of the Varga expedition, but it did not pay to take anything for granted. Those who did usually did not live to enjoy a ripe old age.

  Nate squatted and braced his back against the boulder. Higher on the slope an agitated jay squawked.

  Jays, ravens, and squirrels were nature’s sentries. When predators or humans intruded into their domain, they raised a fuss that alerted everyone and everything within earshot.

  Shakespeare cocked his head at the approaching pad of soft footsteps. Deep voices droned softly in a tongue that he could not peg right off.

  Nate sidled silently to the left so he would rise at the opposite end of the boulder from McNair. It was better to be spaced apart in case the owners of those voices proved unfriendly. He did not take his eyes off his mentor, and when McNair nodded, he shot erect, leveling his Hawken.

  Shakespeare realized where he had heard that particular tongue before as he rose. It shouldn’t be, yet there stood four Indians whose features and clothes marked them as dwellers of the desert country many leagues to the southwest.

  The quartet drew up short, the man in the lead starting to lift his rifle but stopping when he saw they were covered. The middle pair carried a buck slung on a long pole balanced on their shoulders.

  All four were bronzed and well muscled. They had long trunks and arms, deep chests but narrow shoulders, and were bowlegged. Their big heads were framed by black hair clipped below the ears and across the forehead. Their nostrils were flat, wide and fleshy, their feet uncommonly large and splayed.

  Other than long loincloths and high moccasins, they wore only short buckskin jackets. They were armed with rifles and knives, and the warrior at the rear also had a quiver containing a short bow and arrows slung over his shoulder.

  They were Maricopas, Shakespeare realized. To find them here, in the Rockies, was as unsettling as it would be to run across an Apache in New York City.

  So far as Shakespeare knew, the tribe was largely friendly to whites. The Maricopas, and their allies, the Pimas, had long helped the white man in their mutual relentless war against the Apaches. Hardy warriors in their own right, the Maricopas lived in villages and eked out a living by hunting and tilling the soil.

  “We mean you no harm,” Shakespeare said in the Pima tongue, which most Maricopas were familiar with. He did not know the Maricopa language itself. During the six months he had spent in Apache country years ago, he had lived with Pimas.

  The foremost warrior seemed surprised. Smiling, he said, “I am Chivari. I did not think to hear a white man from this country use the tongue of our friends, the Pimas.”

  “You are far from home,” Shakespeare said.

  Chivari’s eyes saddened. “Very far. I would rather be with my family and friends than here in this strange land. But we did not have a choice.”

  Shakespeare came around the boulder, lowering his rifle. “Every man has a choice,” he said.

  “Not when a great man with many guns comes into your village and tells you to go with him or else your people will suffer,” Chivari said.

  They were made to come at gunpoint? Just as Shakespeare was going to ask, the fourth warrior grunted and said loudly, “Why do we delay? Don Varga sent us to bring meat for them to eat. He will be most displeased if we bring it late.”

  Chivari took offense. “Are we dogs, then, Azul, to scamper at their beck and call?” To Shakespeare, he said, “We are with the great man camped below on the plain.”

  “Manuel de Varga,” Shakespeare said.

  “And his sons.”

  McNair introduced himself and Nate. “We just came from your camp. Señor Varga did not tell us why he is in this country. Perhaps you could?”

  “I cannot,” Chivari said. “He has not told us.”

  “Why were you made to come?”

  “To hunt, to track, to be on the lookout for unfriendly Indians. We were of much help when a band of Comanches tried to steal the horses.”

  “When will you see your home again?”

  “I wish I knew, friend,” Chivari said wistfully. Sighing, he stared toward the prairie. “We must go now.”

  “Be watchful,” Shakespeare cautioned. “You are in Ute territory, and they are fierce fighters.”

  “More fierce than Apaches?” Chivari grinned. “I think not. Yet my people have been fighting Apaches for more summers than any man can remember, and we are still alive.” He thumped his chest. “Maricopas fear no one. Let these Utes come. We will show them why the Apaches have never been able to defeat us.”

  Nate had been listening intently, but the parley was so much gibberish to him. As the four warriors filed off, he stepped to the trail. “Who were they?”

  Shakespeare explained, ending with, “I have to give Varga credit. It was damned clever to bring the Maricopas along. They’re human bloodhounds. And they have twice the endurance of most Mexicans and whites.”

  “But was it fair to Chivari and his friends?” Nate said. “You just told me that they don’t want to be here.”

  “Chivari doesn’t, that’s for sure. I can’t say about the rest. Maybe we’ll get a chance to ask them tonight.” Glancing down, Shakespeare stiffened. “Do you see what I see?”

  Nate looke
d. A clear set of prints stared back up at him. Moccasin tracks left by the Maricopas. Exact duplicates of those he had found near the lake that morning. “One of them was in on it!”

  “That’d be my guess,” Shakespeare agreed. “Let’s catch up and question them.”

  Shakespeare snagged his friend’s sleeve. “Hold on, hoss. Not so fast. We don’t have any proof other than the tracks. Try prodding them and the culprit will clam up. And the Vargas might not take kindly to having their scouts roughed up.”

  “Are you saying I shouldn’t do a thing?”

  “For now.”

  Nate had never had cause to regret heeding his mentor’s advice before. “Very well,” he said, but he did not like it. Not one bit.

  They mounted and resumed the climb, Nate in the lead this time, pushing hard to reach the valley. He did not slacken the pace once, not even when they came to the pass between the sawtooth ridges.

  The setting was as peaceful as ever. Out on the lake ducks were feeding. Gulls wheeled and dipped.

  Nate trotted along the south shore to the path his family used daily. He imagined that Winona and the children would be overjoyed to learn about the invitation. Winona adored having company and visiting others. On their annual treks to the Shoshone village, she spent every evening visiting kin and friends. As for Zach and Evelyn, they were as open and friendly as most kids their age.

  Thinking of them brought a warm smile to Nate’s lips. The smile died, though, when he noticed how quiet it was in the vicinity of the cabin. Zach and Evelyn were forever making noise, and the two women should be close by. But the cabin door was shut. A pall of silence hung over the clearing like a shroud.

  “Winona!” Nate hollered. On receiving no reply, he jabbed his legs against the big black and galloped the rest of the way. He vaulted from the saddle, and was through the door before the stallion came to a stop. The interior was neat and orderly, as always. But no one was there.

  “Zach! Evelyn!” Nate called out, rushing outside. The area nearest the door was a jumble of tracks, too many for anyone to make sense of.