The Texans (18 page)

“You hate me, don't you?” Red Wing asked.

The captain didn't turn around, but he stopped at the edge of the firelight for a moment. “I hate you and your kind more than you will ever know. The Comanche killed my woman and smashed my baby boy's head against a tree because he cried too much. If I was half the man I ought to be, I'd have already wiped them from the face of the earth.”

When the captain was gone, Red Wing shifted her focus to Jim Pockmark sitting wrapped in his blanket. There was a smile on his face and a smirk at the corner of his mouth.

“Don't let the fat captain bother you,” Jim said. “The commissioner laughs at him, the Indians laugh at him, and the Tejanos laugh at him. He is an old fool with a bellyful of lies. He thinks he is the man he tells us he is, but all can see the truth. Right now he is going for the whiskey he keeps in his saddlebags.”

The Delaware's words didn't comfort her. In fact, the look on his scarred and pitted face scared her more than the captain's venom. His dress was a mixture of both the white man and the red, as if he'd taken all the savagery of both worlds for his own. The white cotton shirt belted over his breechclout, and the Mexican straw sombrero atop his long braids might make him seem more trustworthy to some folks, but she felt the renegade in him. It was plain in his calculating gaze, and the cold stillness of his monstrous face.

“I could get you away from these men,” he said.

“Oh?” Despite wanting nothing more than her freedom, she was sure she wanted no part of what was working behind his glittering eyes.

“Do you doubt this?” He chuckled softly and smiled at the other two Delawares around him, as if any question of his prowess were laughable. “The fat captain will be drunk before long. I could slit his big belly open and choke him with his own guts before he even knew I was there.”

The other two scouts didn't laugh with Jim, but they didn't say anything against the idea either. Red Wing found herself looking into the dark for signs of the commissioner's return.

“If you stay with these fools, maybe you die or maybe you end up back with the Comanche. I say you go with me.”

She glanced out of the corners of her eyes to where Agent Torrey was snoring. He was no match for the three Delawares, but maybe just his being awake would temper the mutinous scheme Jim was working himself up to.

“Don't even look at that little man. I haven't made my mind up yet, but if you wake him I will take his nutsack for a tobacco pouch.” Jim was enjoying trying to scare her.

“Would you take me back to my home?” She stalled for time.

“You come with me, and if after a while you still want to go home, I'll let you.”

He hadn't risen, or even taken his arms out from under his blanket, but the threat of him was so great that she felt like he was looming above her. She rose quickly and walked into the night. The direction the commissioner had gone would have taken her right by the Delawares, and instinct told her that she needed to be far away from them. Her plan was to get out of the firelight and circle until she was near where the horses were tied. Surely the commissioner or the captain had gone to stand guard over their mounts.

The timber along the riverbank was thick and she felt somewhat protected by its cover. When she heard somebody coming behind her, she tried not to panic. If she remained still in the dark, surely they could not find her. She debated shouting for help but feared the Delawares might be counting on her to do so. The commissioner and the captain were the only protection she had, and leading them into an ambush would seal her fate. She waited behind the trunk of a hackberry tree, her ears straining for the slightest of sounds.

Her pursuer was very near. She plainly heard his moccasins brushing against the grass. Her foot bumped against something at the foot of the tree, and she knelt to feel in the dark. Her hand found a thick, broken branch and she wrapped her fingers tightly around it. The stick and the knife in her pocket were all that she had to defend herself with. The sound of slow, stealthy footsteps came again, and she stood with her club at ready. He was so close she could smell him, and he was going to come on her right. Her pounding heartbeats made seconds seem like hours, and she willed herself not to strike too quick.

Chapter 20

R
ed Wing swung her club with all the power she could muster. She felt the half-rotten limb break as it struck solidly into flesh. She drew back the broken remains of her weapon for another swing. The shadow before her lunged against her and knocked her backward to the ground. His weight pinned her among the underbrush and she could feel the heat of him and his foul breath upon her face. She bucked and writhed under him and struggled frantically to get at the knife in her pocket. Something struck her jaw and another blow grazed her chin and sunk into her shoulder.

She felt the keen edge of a knife against her throat and she went still while the night swirled with splotches of color before her eyes. She tried to maintain her hold on consciousness and to will her numb right arm to fend off the knife before her throat was cut. The moon was just big enough to silhouette the Delaware against the stars overhead. The black shadow of him laughed, and when she cried out faintly and tried to roll away he struck her again. Her struggles pressed her throat ever so slightly against his blade, and she felt the warmth of her own blood spreading slowly to her collarbone.

His hands jerked viciously at the front of her dress and his knee lifted her skirt and fought to force itself between her knees. She had intended to make him kill her or leave her be, but she was too weak.

“You scream if you want to, but I'm going to make a good Injun out of you.” Jim's voice was so husky with passion and exertion he might not have been human at all.

He pressed the knife into her more than he intended to while he fought her skirt, and the edge bit into her skin again. She made one last weakened effort to find his face with her fingernails. He hit her again so hard that the rebound of her head against the ground was as bad as his fist, and she felt her lips split beneath his knuckles. Something was wrong with her vision and she could barely see his shadow anymore. He was no more than a panting wisp of smoke in a nightmare.

The night exploded and was lit up with a brief flash. The knife against her throat slid lightly off her neck, and Jim Pockmark's lifeless, smothering weight covered her. She pushed wildly at his torso and squirmed from beneath him. Her breath was coming in ragged gasps and she scrambled away on hands and knees. She threw a wild look back over her shoulder to see if she was being pursued and ran into something in the night.

She pushed herself away at arm's length and knelt to look up at the tall shadow above her. Her fumbling hand found the knife in her pocket and she lunged forward with it, seeking to bury it in her attacker. A rough hand grabbed her wrist and pinned her arm wide while another hand took the side of her face and bent her head backward until she was looking up at her new assailant once more.

“It's me, Red Wing. It's Will,” the voice said as if out of a dream.

She screamed again and tried to lunge to her feet. She couldn't break free of him, and fell against his legs, thrashing like a wildcat.

“Calm down. It's all over. You're all right.”

This time something about the voice registered with her, and she ceased to fight. She felt the knife taken gently from her hand and the soft touch of fingers brushing back the hair from her face.

“Is that Jim Pockmark I shot?” the commissioner asked.

For the first time she truly recognized the voice and realized that she was crying. She wiped at the blood and grime caking her face and dared to look back at the still form lying on the ground.

“Yes.” She sobbed.

He pulled her into his legs and she wrapped her arms about his knees and pressed her cheek against his thigh. She needed to feel safe, and his hands were comforting rubbing into her shoulders and stroking the top of her head.

“He won't bother you again. He won't bother anybody,” the comissioner said quietly. “Let me help you back to the fire.”

For a moment her legs refused to work, but she finally managed to stand and lean against him. He encircled her waist with one strong arm and started her slowly back to their camp, pausing when she needed him to. They passed close by Jim Pockmark's body with its cold, cruel face staring up at the stars with a bullet hole in the forehead, and its mouth wide open as if in shock or to accuse. But she didn't look down at him, she wouldn't.

“Oh, Will,” she said as she pressed herself into his side, needing and trying to bury herself in the strength she felt in him.

“I'll protect you.” He pressed his face into her hair and held her tight until he felt her body grow stronger again.

The walked slowly into the firelight. Agent Torrey was sitting up and rubbing his sleepy eyes. The other two Delawares were just where they had been before, and for all appearances they might not have even blinked since she left.

The commissioner held her with one arm and placed his free hand on the butt of the other unfired pistol in his sash. “I killed that damned Jim Pockmark.”

The Delawares stared at Red Wing and the commissioner with blank faces. One of them lay down and rolled over until his back was to them and the fire. The other grunted and nodded his head.

“Jim, he think all the time. He thought he'd maybe take that woman to Mexico and sell her for many horses. I told him that his thinking would get him killed,” the sitting Delaware said.

“Well, he won't be thinking anymore. Have you got a problem with that?”

The Delaware looked shocked. “Me? No, I just want to go to sleep.”

He did just that, and soon the two scouts at least appeared to be asleep, neither one of them showing the slightest concern or curiosity about their fellow tribesman's corpse. The commissioner sat down, and Red Wing kept close to him. She realized that his arm was still around her, but she couldn't make herself move away. She hated the weakness she felt. Despite all the things she held against him, she felt safe and protected in his embrace.

The gunshot and the commissioner's brief conversation with the Delawares seemed to have finally gotten through to Agent Torrey's sleep-fuddled brain. He jumped to his feet with his shotgun in hand and marched a half circle around the sleeping forms of the scouts. He looked as on edge as a cat in a yard full of snakes, ready to jump back at the slightest sign of life from the two Indians.

“What happened? Did I hear you say you shot Jim?” he asked.

The commissioner frowned and cast his eyes down at Red Wing's head on his shoulder. “There's a bit of coffee in my saddlebags that I've been holding back. I think Red Wing could use it now.”

Agent Torrey caught his drift and decided his questions could wait until later. It was obvious that Red Wing had been attacked, and he busied himself with making coffee. He tried to appear happy and calm for her sake, but his hands shook and rattled the lid on the coffeepot. He looked an apology at her, and she managed a hint of a smile.

“When you get that coffee on the coals, go see if you can find Captain Jones,” the commissioner said.

Agent Torrey had no desire to go out in the night alone, especially considering the latest revelation that even the scouts weren't to be trusted, but he did as he was told. He just hoped that the captain wasn't already so drunk that he mistook him for a wild Indian after the horses.

By the time the coffee was ready Agent Torrey had returned with his charge. The captain's face was flushed and he was a bit unsteady on his feet, but he took the news fairly well. The coffee did them all some good and they enjoyed it quietly until it was gone.

The commissioner tried to get Red Wing to go to sleep, but she shook her head and stared into the fire. Her face was bloody from a deep cut above one eye, and her lips were swollen and split. She had managed to straighten and hold together the top of her torn dress, and to pin her hair back out of her eyes. He thought she was beautiful, even then. There was a softness and vulnerability about her that he had never imagined, much less seen before. He cursed himself for what he was thinking but knew just as well that if she asked him to take her home in the morning, he would.

“What are we going to do for guides now?” Captain Jones finally asked.

The commissioner studied the Delawares in their blankets. “They didn't seem too bothered by it all.”

But he was wrong. They went to their blankets late in the night, with Red Wing lying between the commissioner and Agent Torrey on the far side of the fire and the captain sleeping propped up against his saddle with his rifle cradled in his arm. The sun was well up in the sky when they awoke, and the first thing they noticed was that the Delawares were gone.

Chapter 21

O
dell tried hard to interpret the story Son Ballard and Placido read easily from the confusing mix of day-old tracks crossing the sandy wash. The old frontiersman and the Tonk chief discussed the large Comanche camp that had left the sign while Odell tried to improve his tracking skills. However, all he could be sure of after a long study was the fact that Indians on barefoot ponies had headed off toward the river sometime earlier. He only knew it was Indians from the lines their travois poles had etched into the ground and the large number of dog tracks present.

“Do you think they spotted us?” Odell asked.

Son grinned at Placido before answering Odell. “Hell, boy, I don't care how many cold camps that Prussian insists we make. You can't move through the country with this many men without every Injun out here knowing about it.”

That was just what Odell feared. There was no way they were going to head off the Peace Commission before the Comanches decided to attack them. The odds were that numerous small hunting bands or raiding parties had already seen them or crossed their trail.

“Do you think we can find the Peace Commission out here?” Finding a girl and a handful of men out on the vast expanse seemed an almost impossible concept to Odell.

Son rubbed his whiskered chin and winced at the question. “We could if we had enough time, but we might have to fight the Comanche every day between now and then.”

“Maybe I should just cut north for the Canadian on my own. A man alone might have a better chance of not getting spotted,” Odell said.

“There's no guarantee you'd find them on the Canadian. Even if you knew where they were, it wouldn't be easy. If you didn't get scalped on the way, how would you force Houston's men to turn her over?”

“I guess if they wouldn't listen I could maybe sneak her off from them.” Odell always felt like a clumsy child around the old man. His pappy had made him feel that same way.

Placido shook his head at Odell's endless questioning and kicked his pony across the wash, leaving Odell and Son alone.

“What's the matter with him?” Odell asked.

Son took a deep breath and pointed at the Tonk's back. “Old Placido has lived in this country longer than any of us. He's fought Comanches and he knows them like we never will. They even say his mama was a Comanche.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“It means that he thinks you're a damned fool. You wouldn't stand a fart's chance in a windstorm of finding that Peace Commission before the Comanches got you,” Son said. “We don't have much chance of finding your gal as it is, but our only hope is Placido's Tonks, or that we run across some friendly Injuns that have spotted who we're looking for.”

“If you didn't believe we could stop Houston's bunch, why did you come along?” Odell found Son's pessimistic attitude to be highly irritating.

“Because there's one thing I can guarantee you about this whole trip. That Prussian is going to find him a fight with the Comanches.”

“Those Comanches owe me plenty, but starting a war out here is liable to get Red Wing killed or lost to me forever. I came along with y'all to rescue her, and that's what I still aim to do,” Odell said.

“You listen well and stay close to me and Placido, and maybe you'll do just that. At the worst you might keep your hair.” Son reached out with his pointer finger and drug it across Odell's forehead while he made a cutting sound between his own teeth. “Right now we'd better catch up to Placido and his scouts if you want to learn a thing or two about Comanches.”

They loped after Placido, and Odell thought about what Son had told him. All the Texans seemed to set great store by Placido's skills, and there was something about him that made you want to be his friend. But there was also something scary about him. At one moment Odell found himself admiring the big Tonk, and the next moment he gave him the chills. He knew what was bothering him. He didn't know much about Indians, but he had been in Texas long enough to hear some things.

“Are the Tonks really man-eaters?” he asked.

Son grinned. “Sure enough.”

Odell let that ruminate in his mind while Crow rocked along underneath him. “You're pulling my leg.”

“I'm telling you the truth. They ain't as bad about it as the Kronks, what we call the Karankawas down on the Gulf, but they'll fry up a man from time to time,” Son said. “They say after the Plum Creek fight Placido and his Tonks went among their fallen enemies and cut off their hands, feet, and other choice parts. The next morning they ate that Comanche meat like it was fine cuts of fat hog.”

“Why the hell are we riding with them then?”

“Lots of Texans despise the Tonks for beggars and man-eaters, but you take your help where you can find it,” Son said. “The Tonks figured out a long time ago that they couldn't whip us, or the Comanches. Being pinned between the two of us they had to pick sides or get rubbed out quick. They hate a Comanche as much or more than we do, track better than we ever will, and never get lost.”

“You seem to set store by Placido,” Odell said.

Son nodded while he considered that. “I ain't the only one. The latecomers to Texas might not have any use for him, but those of us that have ridden and fought with him consider the man a friend. I've never known him to be anything but loyal, and there ain't a man in Texas that's fought the Comanches longer. In fact, he's just about more Texan than any Texan I know.”

“I just don't particularly care for the thought of being eaten,” Odell said.

“Hell, boy. They don't eat Texans, or nobody else real regular,” Son growled. “It ain't any skin off our backs if they think they can get some of their enemies' power by chawing on them, or even if they just like the taste of man.”

“That still doesn't make it right.”

Son's patience was short-lived. “If you're going to understand any kind of Injun, you'll have to forget all your raising. I count a few of them as friends, but I don't try and make them fit into my mold either. Injuns laugh and love, and there are good and bad among them just like us. But at the same time, they aren't anything like us. They have their own set of rules. You and I might think they're backward and primitive, but they find us just as strange. That's why one of us has to win, and the other is going to lose everything.”

“If they're just primitive, how come they ain't changed their ways since we came along?”

“If somebody showed up and right off started telling you that all you believed in was wrong, would you listen to them?” Son asked. “You take the Comanche for instance. His way of life has served him well for a long, long time, and carved him out a big chunk of country. You might say his way of life suits the where and when he lives. But times are changing, and I'd say the fact that they won't change will be the end of them.”

“You sound like an Indian lover,” Odell said a little mockingly.

“Hell, no. If it's going to be them or us, I know who I'm rooting for. Those damned Comanches ain't easy to love, and if we want Texas for ourselves I'd say we ought to be glad that there's such a hateful bunch to take it away from. That way we won't have anything to feel guilty about afterward.”

They loped along in silence for another mile. Odell was willing to let the conversation go at that, but it seemed to be bothering the old scout.

“You'd better remember where you're at. Texas ain't like no other place. I love her to death, but she's hard and she's mean.” Son raised his voice over the wind that had picked up speed throughout the afternoon until it was bending the grass over and blowing up waves of dust. “The Comanches have to go, but you stay out here long enough and you'll start to live more and more like them.”

There wasn't time for them to argue more, for Placido had stopped just ahead of them on the edge of a bit of canyon country stretching across the plains. The Prussian's force had finally reached the Clear Fork of the Brazos after three days of hard riding from the San Saba. On their way north they had experienced relatively easy traveling on the prairie divides between one river and the next ever since they crossed the Concho. Their route took them east of the high escarpment of the Staked Plains, and they avoided the canyons and rugged country that footed it. The Tonks had led them to good water for the most part, and scattered herds of buffalo kept them fed even at the speed they traveled. Nobody thus far had to eat their saddles as Son had predicted.

Placido led them out onto an eroded point overlooking the river. A handful of Tonk scouts had dismounted and were sitting in the shade of their horses, watching the country across the river. Placido and Son got down and loosened their cinches and motioned Odell to do the same. The prairie they had come from dropped off into a rugged area of bluffs and shallow, eroded canyons. A few miles or so across the river Odell could see open country again.

While the rest of them sat and stared at the horizon, Odell leaned against Crow with his arms draped over the saddle seat. He wasn't sure what they were looking for, but assumed they were scouting out possible ambush by the Comanche. He tried to be patient and will himself to a careful study of the terrain, but his stomach was cramping too badly for him to focus properly.

His guts gurgled violently and suddenly, and he walked away from his companions at as fast a pace as he dared while still maintaining control of his bowels. He barely made the privacy of a little clump of salt cedars a few yards away without messing himself. He could hear the Tonks laughing at him while he squatted in the bushes, and knew that his white butt must be visible through the limbs. The diarrhea that had plagued him since the day before was too much misery to worry about his loss of dignity. He finally pulled up his pants and tried to ignore the jeering grins on the Tonks' faces as he made his way back to the group.

“Got the gyp-water squirts, do ya?” Son obviously found Odell's ailment humorous.

“I've been like this ever since we stopped at that little creek north of the Concho. Everything I eat or drink runs straight through me, and I'm cramping so bad I can barely sit up straight,” Odell said.

“Mix you up some salt water tonight with a little pinch of gunpowder and drink it. That always works for me.” Son pointed to the north. “We can't have you shitting yourself to death before those Comanches yonder get a chance at you.”

Odell strained to make out the enemies Son was pointing toward. He expected to see Comanches riding down the river, but no matter how hard he looked he saw nothing. Son noticed and pointed toward a little steep-sided canyon running north out of the river. A thin finger of smoke trickled from it.

“Comanche camp, maybe,” Placido observed.

“How's he know it's Comanches?” Odell studied the Tonk chief cautiously. Son's explanation of Indian ways had made some sense to him, but Odell still couldn't quit thinking about Placido being a cannibal, and a man who laughed at white men with the drizzling shits.

Son looked at him like he was stupid for asking a question with such an obvious answer. Had Odell waited a few seconds before opening his mouth, it would have saved him some embarrassment. He promised himself to ask no more stupid questions. It stood to reason nobody else was going to be foolish enough to build a smoky fire right in the middle of Comancheria—unless they had found the Peace Commission at last.

Placido mounted again, and the rest of them followed his lead. They rode back and met the Prussian at the head of the long line of his volunteers. Despite the grassy plain they had come across, all the men were caked in dust, their faces almost white with it except where the sweat had washed it away in streaks. They were spread out for a quarter of a mile at a steady walk with a sort of grim determination about them that reminded Odell of a herd of buffalo on the move.

The Prussian calmly listened to his scouts' report, and then turned back to face the men spreading out behind him. “By
Gott
, the Tonks have found Comanches across the river, and we are going to pay them a visit.”

Nobody cheered or chunked their hats in the air, but every man of them went to checking his weapons and gear. Quiet words were passed, and in the matter of a few minutes the party was split in two. Placido and Son led one half of them to the east, intending to circle around and come on the Comanche camp from the north. The Prussian held the rest behind to give them time to get in position.

“I don't see any need in picking a fight here when we're supposed to be after the Peace Commission,” Odell said to Son as they crossed the river.

“The Prussian isn't going to pass up a chance to kill Comanches,” Son said.

They were within a mile of the smoke trailing up out of the canyon, and Odell couldn't tell if it was the gyp water or his nerves causing the butterflies in his stomach. He had checked the priming on his rifle three times and couldn't seem to find a comfortable position in his saddle. Talking helped calm him.