White Apache 9 Page 8

  The smugglers talked in low tones. Every so often one would laugh or curse. Toward midnight most of them turned in, sprawling out under the stars. The Mimbre girl was shoved into a wagon. The Red Witch and her husky friend entered another and vanished under a blanket. One man was left to stand guard. He roved the perimeter for a while, then tired and sat on a flat rock near the fire, warming his hands.

  Time passed. The wagon into which the Red Witch and her admirer had gone commenced to squeak and jiggle, proving the rumors to be true. At least it was a common enough occurrence that the guard did not even look up and none of the sleepers awoke.

  White Apache found himself growing drowsy sometime around two in the morning. He drew back from the edge and stood. Pacing, he shook his arms and turned his head back and forth to get his blood flowing.

  Although Clay tried his utmost to emulate the Chiricahua, he could not yet go for days at a time without sleep, as they could. Delgadito had revealed that training along those lines started when Apache boys were about ten years old. They would be encouraged to stay up later and later, until they could go a whole night without rest. Later, they would go two nights. It was all part of their everyday practice for when they would be old enough to go on raids. Clay had gone two nights once, and been so tired on the morning of the third day that he had slept fourteen straight hours without stirring. Delgadito had laughed, joking how Clay had the stamina of a five year old and needed the rest of a person over eighty.

  Of course, that had been back in the days when Clay and Delgadito were the best of friends. Or so Clay had believed until Cuchillo Negro secretly let him know that he was a pawn in Delgadito’s grand scheme to regain a position of prominence in the tribe.

  Since then, thanks to a series of quirks of fate, Clay had been the one who grew in influence while Delgadito’s standing among his fellows had waned. Clay knew that Delgadito resented it. Every time one of the others looked to Clay for advice, Delgadito stewed.

  By unspoken agreement, Clay Taggart now found himself the leader of the band. More and more, important decisions were left to him. It had been his idea, for instance, to steal women for wives. He had been the one to lead the last few raids, and no one had seen fit to object.

  Not even Delgadito, which troubled Clay. The warrior was not one to stand by and do nothing while someone else usurped his position. Yet Delgadito had lifted neither his voice nor a finger in protest. It made Clay suspect that the crafty renegade was up to something, that Delgadito had a plan to turn the tables somewhere down the line. Probably when Clay least expected.

  Clay shrugged. If it was meant to be, so be it. He had no choice but to go on with things as they were and hope to hell he did not wind up with cold steel buried between his ribs one dark night.

  Unknown to the Chiricahua, Clay has his own plan. He had to keep the band together at all costs, so that one day soon he could launch a campaign of terror against those who had wronged him, Before it was over, Arizona soil would run red with the blood of his enemies.

  More time went by. White Apache lay back down. By the position of the constellations he knew that dawn was approximately an hour off.

  It was time.

  There had been three changes of guard overnight. A wiry Mexican whose spurs jangled as he walked was at that moment making a circuit of the wagons and the stock. A Spencer slanted across his left shoulder, he whistled softly, not paying much attention to his surroundings.

  Exactly as the White Apache had counted on. Holding the Winchester close to his side, he crept to the very brink. The unwary smuggler, shuffling slowly, passed beneath him and began to loop to the east.

  White Apache went over the edge. Body flat, wriggling like an oversized serpent, he wormed onto the brush-littered slope and headed toward the bottom of the gully. He had to exercise the utmost care. The incline was littered with small stones, and in spots the earth itself was loose. Dislodging either would alert the man on guard.

  A bush barred his path. White Apache made like an eel, slanting to the right to go around it. He paused to lift his head high enough to see the Mexican. The man had slowed and was searching in his pockets, possibly for the makings of a cigarette.

  White Apache slid lower. He was so intent on not making any noise that he did not give much notice to the weeds to his right. If he had, he might have seen some of them quiver, as if to the passage of a slender form. If he had, he would not have been taken by surprise when a clump of stems unexpectedly parted and the blunt snout of a roving rattlesnake poked out.

  Its forked tongue flicking, the deadly reptile slithered into the open, straight toward Clay Taggart.

  Chapter Seven

  William Randolph had tossed and turned most of the night. Sleeping outdoors, in his estimation, was a barbaric practice, fit for country bumpkins and simple savages, but certainly not for a man of culture and refinement. Lying on the ground was torture compared to the wonderfully soft king-size bed he customarily slept in back in New York.

  Even having three blankets under him and two on top did not help. Each morning he got up to find bruises everywhere. His skin was just too delicate for him to live primitively for any length of time. Yet that was exactly what he had been doing for the better part of a week.

  The reporter frowned and sat up. Since he couldn’t sleep, he might as well rise and get a pot of coffee brewing. Sunrise could not be far off, and a piping hot cup of Arbuckle’s would go a long way toward restoring his spirits.

  Stretching, Randolph surveyed the camp. Ten feet away slept the accursed woman, a blanket pulled clear up to her chin. In repose her features were angelic, almost beautiful, and for a moment he almost forgot all the trouble she had given him. Almost, but not quite.

  Randolph smirked. Little did she know that he had outsmarted her, that her plea to Governor Goodwin had been wasted effort. The governor’s safe-conduct pass would not save her precious cousin now.

  One of the three men hired in Tucson to accompany Randolph and Amelia was over by the horses, keeping watch. Smoke curled from a pipe in his mouth.

  The reporter regarded the trio as typical border ruffians. Their clothes were largely unkempt, their chins coated with rough stubble. Their sole redeeming grace was Quid’s assurance that all three were proficient gunmen and knew how to live off the land.

  Randolph knelt next to the smoldering embers of their campfire and added fuel to rekindle it. He had to hand it to Benjamin Quid. The bounty hunter had proved to be as good as his word.

  The day they met, across from the Park Theatre in Tucson, Randolph had sensed a kindred soul. Like him, Quid worshiped the almighty dollar. Like him, Quid would do anything to fill his pockets. And like him, Quid could be as devious as a fox when it came to getting his way.

  Once Randolph had heard the bounty hunter’s tale of being made a fool of by the White Apache, Randolph knew he had his man. He had made his pitch and been overjoyed when Quid readily agreed to a 60/40 split. Quid’s partner, Plunkett, had complained that he thought their cut should be more until Randolph pointed out that he was the only one who could get Amelia to do as they wanted, and without her unwitting help, they had no means of luring Clay Taggart into a trap.

  For over an hour that day, Randolph and the two bounty hunters had sat in a murky corner of the saloon, plotting. Quid had agreed to find several reliable men to accompany Amelia and him. Since the bounty hunter knew the region fairly well, Quid had also suggested an ideal spot for the ambush.

  Now, after almost a week of travel, Randolph and Amelia were nearing that spot, a place known as Devil’s Canyon situated deep in the Dragoon Mountains. Why it was called Devil’s Canyon, no one seemed to know. The important thing was there was only one way in or out.

  Quid and Plunkett and two men with them had been shadowing Randolph and Amelia since they left Tucson. The bounty hunters would lie in wait at the canyon mouth, and when Clay Taggart rode into their sights, they would cut him to ribbons in a hail of lead.

  T
he White Apache would be gunned down before he could reach his cousin. Amelia would never get to give him the safe-conduct pass, so the bounty would still be in force when he was slain.

  Randolph chuckled to himself. He had the plan worked out to the letter. Nothing could go wrong.

  At that moment, the loud crackle of a branch catching flame brought Amelia Taggart out of a troubled sleep. She had been having a horrible dream in which Clay was being led up a gallows to a waiting noose. A huge throng ringed the scaffold. In a panic, she had tried to push through them to get to him, but no one would move aside to let her pass. His head had been stuck into the noose and the hangman had tightened it around his throat. Then, just as the hooded figure was about to throw the lever that would drop the trap door and send Clay to his doom, her cousin had looked up, gazed smack into her eyes and asked sadly, “How could you, Amelia? How could you?”

  Amelia had long believed that dreams were important. Some were windows to a person’s innermost thoughts; others were omens of things to come. Whichever the case in this instance, his question haunted her as she rose and ran a hand through her tangled hair.

  Randolph had not yet noticed her. He was grinning, as if at a secret joke.

  It puzzled Amelia. He had been acting strangely ever since her visit with the governor. For a while he had been in a funk, hardly speaking unless spoken to, giving her the impression that she had done something wrong.

  On reaching Tucson, the newsman’s attitude had changed again. Suddenly he had been all smiles, as considerate as could be.

  Amelia did not know what to make of his peculiar behavior. Her intuition warned that he was up to something, yet what it might be eluded her.

  Had the dream been an omen in that regard? Amelia pondered. Or was it a reflection on her efforts? Governor Goodwin had promised to do all in his power to ensure Clay spent the rest of his life in prison instead of being hanged, but maybe the governor’s influence would do no good. Maybe Clay would go to the gallows, and it would all be her fault.

  Amelia walked past the two gunmen who were still asleep. “Good morning, Mr. Randolph,” she said softly, so as not to awaken them.

  Randolph was so startled, he jumped. Sheepishly, he replied, “Good morning to you, Miss Taggart. I trust you slept well?”

  “Not really, no.”

  “It’s the excitement of soon seeing your cousin again after so many years,” Randolph said. “Just think. By this time tomorrow we’ll be at Devil’s Canyon. Then all we have to do is make camp and wait for Clay to show up.”

  In a leather case beside Amelia’s saddle were the circulars her benefactor had made up before they left Tucson. Amelia regarded it thoughtfully. “Do you really think it will work? What if he doesn’t see them?”

  Randolph added a handful of twigs to the growing flames. “I’ve been assured that word of mouth spreads news fast in this region. Sooner or later your cousin will learn of your whereabouts. He’ll come. Trust me.”

  “But what if it’s too late? What if we’ve left?”

  Randolph humored her. “My dear, we have enough provisions to last us a month, which is more than enough time.” He stared at the man smoking a pipe. “My only worry is that your cousin might not come alone. Mr. Stirco and his friends are fine shots, but there are only three of them.”

  “Clay would never let me come to any harm. And I won’t let him or his Apache friends hurt you, not after all you’ve done on his behalf.”

  “How sweet of you,” Randolph said, amused by the delicious irony. Upending the dregs in the coffeepot, he made for the shallow stream they had been following for the past two days.

  A pink tinge adorned the eastern horizon, and somewhere far off birds were chirping.

  Randolph had to concede a certain humble charm to the wilderness. The stark mountains, the vista of rolling slopes and gorges and ravines, had a crudely majestic air about them. In a limited way, so did the sea of boulders and sand and blistered earth. When he got home, he would tell all his friends that Arizona was an interesting place to visit, but no one in their right mind would ever want to live there.

  Amelia sat on a log to warm herself. The other gunmen were stirring. Soon they would be on their way again, another day spent in the saddle under the broiling sun. She didn’t mind. She was growing to love this rugged land with its crags and buttes and mesas, with its beautiful canyons, its picturesque chaparral, its forests of stately ponderosa pines. Arizona Territory stirred her soul as Ohio and Missouri never had. It helped her to understand why her cousin had stayed.

  If only he hadn’t turned renegade.

  What could he possibly hope to gain, other than an early grave?

  ~*~

  Clay Taggart might have been inclined to agree. He froze as the sidewinder slithered toward him. Suddenly it coiled and reared, its head less than two feet from his neck. He held himself still as the snake swayed and rattled its tail.

  The Mexican on guard heard. Spinning, the man leveled his rifle and cocked his head, attempting to pinpoint exactly where the sound came from.

  Out of the corner of an eye, White Apache watched the rattlesnake. He tensed his arms to roll aside if it came at him even though his reflexes were no match for the reptile’s flashing speed. Its tongue darted in his direction, again and again. Its tail rose, rattling louder. He could see the tips of its fangs through its parted lips.

  White Apache also saw the guard coming toward the west slope. It wouldn’t take the man long to notice him, lying in an open spot as he was. He had to crawl into the weeds, but any movement, however slight, might provoke the rattlesnake into attacking.

  The sidewinder slid closer. Moving slowly, almost hypnotically, it lowered its head and crawled to within inches of Clay’s throat, which was no more than a hand’s width above the ground. It stopped rattling.

  Clay’s skin prickled. He broke out in a cold sweat. A bite in the arm or the leg he could deal with, and possibly survive. No one, though, ever lived after being bitten in the neck. The venom would reach his heart in seconds. Paralysis would set in within the first minute. Within three, he would be in convulsions. Within five, he would be dead.

  The guard, almost at the bottom, was scouring the slope, lower down.

  White Apache lost sight of the sidewinder’s head. He felt something tickle his throat, and moments later the head appeared on his right side, moving slowly away. The snake brushed him several times. In each instance he erupted in goose bumps. Soon the tail slid out from under him, but he stayed where he was until the rattler entered a patch of dry brush.

  None too soon.

  The Mexican had started to climb. He was slightly north of White Apache’s position, slinking toward a rock outcropping.

  Drawing his Bowie, White Apache angled to intercept the man. A silent kill was called for. And a swift one. There was no telling how soon the other smugglers would wake up.

  Abruptly, the guard halted and pivoted.

  White Apache was screened by sparse brush. In broad daylight he would have been spotted. At night, shrouded in shadow, he was safe. Or so he thought until the Mexican hiked the Spencer and peered right at him. Quickly, he reversed his grip on the Bowie so that he held it by the flat of the blade. The guard took a stride. Then another.

  Higher up, a pebble rattled.

  Instinctively, the Mexican swung toward the sound, and as he did, White Apache reared onto his knees, flung back his right arm and hurled the heavy Bowie with all the skill and strength at his command.

  The range was only ten feet. The big knife was a blur. Flying end over end, it reached the guard as the man turned back. There was a spongy thunk. The Bowie sliced through the man’s shirt and flesh, sinking to the hilt. A gurgle of shock burst from the Mexican, who dropped the Spencer, grabbed the knife and pulled. The knife came partway out, no more. Blood gushed as the guard staggered, opening his mouth to warn his friends.

  White Apache shot to his feet and sprinted toward the man to shut him up. It w
as hopeless, though. He could never reach him in time.

  Someone else did. A brawny arm looped around the guard’s neck from the rear. A long butcher knife speared into his ribs three times in swift succession. At the last stroke, the Mexican gave up the ghost, crumpling in a miserable heap.

  Fiero, bloody knife in hand, grinned broadly at White Apache. The warrior was in his element. He lived for the intoxicating thrill of combat, for the tingling joy that slaying enemies brought him. Even by Chiricahua standards, Fiero was bloodthirsty. He would be the first to admit as much. He would also admit that he liked being the way he was, and he had no intention of ever changing.

  White Apache rushed over to reclaim the Bowie. Fiero said nothing, just melted into the grass. In moments White Apache was doing the same. He glided rapidly to the gully floor, verified that none of the horses or mules had caught the scent of fresh blood, then scrambled under the nearest wagon. It happened to be the same one the Red Witch and her lover had climbed into.

  Some of the smugglers were snoring. Others slept quietly, blissfully ignorant of the bronzed death descending upon them.

  White Apache, Bowie in hand, crawled to the inner wheel. Beyond it lay a half-breed, one arm crooked over his face. Setting down the Winchester, White Apache inched around the wheel’s rim. He was almost close enough for a killing stroke when the breed’s arm moved.

  The man was awake. He saw White Apache. From his mouth ripped the terrified cry, “Apache! Apache! Cuidado, amigos! Cuidado!”

  All hell broke loose. Smugglers sprang from their blankets, some fumbling for rifles, others drawing pistols. The half-breed pushed erect but only got to one knee before White Apache was on him. A revolver glinted. It went off almost in White Apache’s ear as the Bowie lanced into the cutthroats abdomen above the belt. The man gasped, grunted, and folded over.

  White Apache drew back the Bowie to finish his victim off, but suddenly guns were firing all over the place. Slugs smashed into the wagon, into the spokes of the wheel, into the ground around him. Diving under the wagon, he snatched the Winchester on the fly and rolled out the other side as war whoops rent the air.