Hold Your Fire

by Lisa Mangum

  She wasn’t moving.

  He poked her with his rifle. When she didn’t respond, he poked her harder. Her bare feet were torn from the desert rock and sagebrush. He withdrew a knife, ready to use it if this were a trap. Crouching low, Micah rolled the teenage girl onto her back and drew close, listening for breath.

  It was there, but faint.

  He slapped her across the face. “Hey.”

  Her eyelids lifted, but she didn’t speak, and they quickly fluttered closed. Her face was soiled, lips chapped. He searched for blood but didn’t find any wounds.

  She needed water.

  Certain there weren’t any others about, Micah picked up the girl and draped her across his shoulder like a bushel of cotton, ready with the rifle in his free hand if he needed to use it.

  By the time he reached the porch steps, the sky had turned a dark purple. Any moment now it would change to light blue and the sun would break out over the eastern hills.

  Micah figured the girl had died when he couldn’t get her to drink. He took to washing her scraped feet, but when he disinfected her soles with brandy, the pain brought the girl to consciousness. Awake, she downed several ladles of water, vomited half of it, then took to drinking more.

  “Careful,” Micah said in Apache.

  “Your water is salty,” she replied in English, with barely a trace of a native accent. “I’ve had better tasting sweat.”

  “It’s what I got.” Micah sniffed the water. He barely noticed the smell after twenty years. He shrugged and dropped the ladle in the wooden bucket. “You’re welcome.”

  “For what?”

  “For saving your life.” Micah rose from the table where he sat. The Apache girl didn’t respond. “Ain’t very talkative, are you? You got a name?”

  “Rebecca,” she said. “Foster.”

  “Foster? You Yani’s kin?”

  “Granddaughter.” Her words were soft, weak.

  “Granddaughter? Your grandma blind?”

  “I don’t have a grandmother,” she said. “Least not that I remember.”

  “Everyone’s got a grandma, Becky. It just surprises me that Foster found someone who thought he was good-looking enough to mate with.”

  “He’s not my real grandfather.”

  “Ah, well, that makes sense.” Foster was known to take in strays. He’d taken in Micah, orphaned at the age of six, after other Apaches had killed Micah’s parents. Micah had called him Grandfather, too. But that was another lifetime ago.

  Micah found a bowl and looked in it—clean enough. He wiped out the crumbs with his hand and spooned in some cold beans from a pot on the floor. “How is that old bastard anyway?”

  “Dead.”

  Micah sat the bowl down in front of the girl, trying not to react to the news. He didn’t care for Foster none, not since the old Apache had shot him and left him for dead. It took everything Micah had to not go string up that sonofabitch after learning to walk again. But that was twenty years ago. Time had healed Micah’s wounds, though the scars remained. They hadn’t spoken since.

  And now, he’d learned that his once-friend and mentor, the man who had raised him, had died. He couldn’t help but feel regret for not having had that reconciling moment. Foster had never offered an apology. And Micah had never sought one out.

  Like a rifle blast to his gut, Micah recalled their last encounter with perfect clarity. The two had bumped into each other outside the courthouse. Micah would have drawn his sidearm if he’d had it on him. Instead, he raised a finger and pointed at Foster. “I ever see you again, I’ll kill ya.”

  He hadn’t killed Foster, though Micah had seen him exactly three times after that. Each time, Foster had been in town, going about his business. They avoided each other. Too much regret. Too much shame there. Hard feelings that only grew harder, like scars.

  Micah cleared his throat. “How’d he die?”

  “Murdered.”

  “Murdered? By who?”

  “Some fellas from the Chacon Gang—Burt Dodee and Willy Gomez.”

  “How long ago?”

  “A day’s past. Grandfather told me that if anything were to ever happen to him, I should find you. That you were a Foster too.”

  Micah wasn’t listening. Despite their past, Micah owed it to Foster to track down his killers. Deep down, under the resentment, beneath the hurt and anger, sprouted a seedling of guilt. Maybe it stemmed from not dealing with Foster himself. Or maybe it was because Micah had always believed that their story would have an ending. Foster’s murder left too many things unresolved.

  Micah called up what he knew about the Chacon Gang. Chacon had been arrested for murder a year or so ago but broke out of the Graham county jail. Most believed he’d escaped to Mexico. Burt Dodee and Willy Gomez, however, had been spotted outside of Morenci a few weeks back. Word went out that folks travelling should be wary of doing so alone, as those bastards were known for thieving.

  With a murder hanging over their heads, they’d be doing one of two things. Looking for the girl before she talked to authorities or heading for Mexico.

  “Did they see you?” Micah asked.

  “They think I’m dead. They torched his place and thought I was inside.”

  They’d be heading to Mexico then. “Were they on horses?”

  “Yes.”

  He could guess that they’d come down from Foster’s place at the base of Mount Graham and wrap around either east toward Wilcox or west through the Apache lands. Prudence would say head to Wilcox and from there take a straight shot to Bisbee or Benson. But maybe they wrapped around west to avoid traffic. Micah wouldn’t know until he got there and looked, followed the tracks, but that would take time. More time than he had if he wanted to catch up and head them off before the Mexico border.

  But Micah knew he’d spend weeks wondering, searching, waiting. The tracks would show him.

  “I’m going after them. You can stay here. There’s hardtack and flour under the bed. Water from the well out back.”

  “I’m going with you,” she said around a mouthful of beans.

  “You’ll just slow me down.”

  “I’m going with you. I’m not drinking this piss you call water.”

  “You don’t even have shoes.”

  “I bet you have an old pair of boots under that bed too.”

  Micah considered her. Her face was flush with life, not like the corpse he’d pulled from the field. If it came to it, two would be better than one. If she could keep up.

  “Can you shoot?” he asked.

  “Foster taught me. And you know how good of a shot—Sorry. I didn’t think …” Her face flushed with embarrassment.

  “He tell you what happened?”

  She nodded. “Said he was drunk and thought you were someone else.”

  Micah shrugged off the bad memories. The ones he’d hidden away under his bed of anger. He stuffed them back down; he wasn’t ready to digest them yet.

  “We gotta go.” After finding her an old pair of boots three sizes too big, he directed Rebecca to saddle the two quarter horses in the barn. He prepped several bags with food and ammo. He hung two bedrolls over his shoulders and several leather canteens. This time of year was nice enough, but cooled down at night. He also took his small stash of six-shooters, four of them, and two rifles.

  Rebecca had the horses saddled by the time he arrived, and she helped him load the saddlebags and gear. She looked funny in the boots that nearly rose to her knees, but she hopped onto the stallion no smaller than fifteen hands. Even in her dress and too-big boots, it was like she’d done it a thousand times.

  She did well keeping up with him. By midday, they’d gone up the belly of Mount Graham and were nearing Foster’s place. The streams trickled down and converged into the Frye Creek that fed out toward Safford. Up above the streams, smoke lifted from the smoldering remains of the barn and ranch house. Several apple trees dotted the windy path that led down toward the creek, and the smoke.


  Without direction, Rebecca unsaddled, snatched a rifle and a box of ammo, and climbed the hillside that overlooked the once-standing ranch house. Smart.

  Micah continued on with caution. He scanned the area. Red-tailed squirrels dashed up and down trees, unaware of the violent remains nearby.

  It had been years since Micah had been here, but it was still familiar to him. He’d grown up here. Swam in that creek. Planted those apple trees. Swung from the porch swing, now ash. He’d caught and skinned a black Mojave rattler under that massive tree up the way. It’d made for some good stew.

  What remained of Foster lay at the foot of a charred brass bed frame near the cast-iron stove.

  Anger seeped from under Micah’s bed though he tried to contain it. It came from many places. It came from Foster, the drunken Indian who’d shot him, the loving mentor who had never apologized. That hurt more than the bullets. It came from Dodee and Gomez, the bastards who had killed his onetime friend. And, if he were being honest, it came from himself, too, his pride, his refusal to forgive Foster.

  Foster had taught Micah how to track, so it didn’t take long for him to get his bearings and recognize the outlaws’ imprints in the clay and surrounding brush. To his surprise, the tracks didn’t head back down the mountain, but continued up. He motioned for Rebecca to follow with her horse along the ridgeline above as he kept to the tracks flanking the creek.

  A mile later, Micah and Rebecca’s paths converged at the falls, which were as beautiful as Micah remembered.

  “That them?” Rebecca pointed at the scrub oak with a disturbed section beside it.

  “Yep. Good eye.” The outlaws had peeled away from the creek and headed toward a trail that lead further into the mountain. They weren’t going around it, but over it.

  Micah and Rebecca hurried their pursuit. With two of Foster’s tracking students on the search, they went much quicker than Micah could have on his own. When they reached the trail leading up to Granite Point, they found a small wagon and a dying mule. It had been shot four or five times in the side and lay, in agony, bleeding out, with vultures circling above. The cart’s owner was found several yards away in a gulley. Looked as though they’d used him as target practice after pushing him in. Rebecca put the mule out of its misery.

  By the time dusk fell, they were climbing the switchbacks near Turkey Flats, a beautiful view of the valley outstretched below them.

  Dodee and Gomez weren’t moving fast but were still miles ahead of them. Micah had spotted a campsite a couple hours back where the outlaws had stayed last night and, by the look of things, hadn’t started out again until midday. Seems they’d found a stash of whiskey in that wagon and went to drinking.

  The air chilled quickly in the mountains. Micah asked Rebecca to tend to the horses while he prepared the fire. Frowning, he realized he’d run off without his sack of matches and flask of whiskey. Must’ve left them on the bed.

  “Foster ever show you how to make a bow drill?” Micah asked.

  “No. But I saw him do it a couple times.”

  Micah thought about forgoing the fire, but they’d need it to keep warm at night. It was straight up chilly now. Also, out across the night sky, dark clouds formed. He’d been in these mountains enough as a boy to know it didn’t take much prodding for them to turn into a nasty storm.

  “Best I get on with it then.” Micah went down to the creek. In the light of the half moon, he saw what he needed, but he could have found what he was looking for even in complete darkness. He bent over and combed his fingers through clumps of grass on the creek side. He did this several times to several clumps. With each pass, he got a little more dead grass that he used to form a bird’s nest, wrapping it around, intertwining it just like a robin might.

  Cottonwoods flanked both sides of the creek. They’d been following the green canvas all day up the mountain. He should have thought on it earlier; he could have found a dozen dry pieces to use, but he’d assumed he had his matches. After several passes, he located a dead branch, about three inches wide, that he broke from the towering cottonwood.

  Back at camp he split the branch longways using his knife and a rock, then split it again. It offered a nice plank that he broke down to the length of his arm.

  “Help me with this, Becky.” Micah handed her the plank and his knife. He showed her how to hollow out an inch-wide bowl and notch it, like removing a small slice of pie from the hollowed-out bowl. “The notch is most important,” he said, repeating the exact lesson he’d received from Foster. “It lets the embers fall out. Otherwise you’re just drilling on top of yourself and making a mess.”

  Rebecca got to work carving. Micah went searching for a dead yucca. They’d seen thousands of yuccas that day, but after looking for twenty minutes, Micah worried they were too high up the mountain to find one now. He moved away from the creek, keeping his bearings so he could find camp again. After walking about a mile, he found a pod of yucca and breathed a sigh of relief. He took one of their shoots for the spindle, and he broke off several arms of the yucca for the fibers he’d fashion into a rope.

  Back at camp he snapped off a ten-inch piece of the yucca shoot with his boot and gave it to Rebecca. “Carve this down. It needs to be round like a spindle, straight and smooth. But don’t take off too much. It’s got to be thick enough to sit in your hole there.” He pointed at the plank where she’d hollowed out several inch-sized bowls. He hadn’t asked her to do more than one, but she must not have been lying when she said she’d seen Foster do this before. He’d use the same plank for months making fires from his bow drill.

  Almost there.

  Micah broke the rest of the yucca into a section as long as his arm. This would serve as the bow. Then he took the tip of the yucca arms and peeled back the needle until it gave way, tearing down the length of the arm and removing several strands of plant fiber. He did the same to the others, removing the needle tips and starting to weave the fibers into a quarter-inch-thick rope about four feet long. He pulled on both sides of the rope and felt it hold.

  One more piece.

  He returned to the creek where he found a smooth rock that fit nicely in the palm of his hand. With a shard of granite, he began to peck the rock. He hit it over and over again while walking back to camp.

  “What are you doing?” Rebecca asked.

  “You never peck a rock before?”

  “Nope.” She held out the spindle. The tips were rounded and smooth.

  “Looks good,” Micah said. “To peck a rock you need one that is solid that does the pecking and one that is softer that does the giving. But you want to be careful. If you use some of that clay or sandstone that’s down in the valley, it’ll give way and break, and you’ll have to start all over.”

  As he spoke, he realized how much he knew about this particular skill. And that he’d learned it all from Foster. A skill that now, most didn’t need or use. How long would this talent of making a fire with a bow drill survive in a world that didn’t need it? Probably not long at all.

  That made Micah sad. It wasn’t useless information. In fact, it could be extremely valuable, lifesaving even. But who would teach it? Who would want to learn it? No, sir, that skill wouldn’t last another century, of that Micah was certain.

  “Do you know how to prepare kindling?” Micah asked. Rebecca nodded and went about gathering twigs, leaves, and dried grasses. She put them together and built a tepee around the pile. Foster had taught her that, too.

  After half an hour of pecking, Micah had made a good indention. He let Rebecca try it. It didn’t take her long to find the rhythm.

  “Now, you want to smooth it out. The smoother the better. So rub your finger over your face, then rub it in the groove you’ve been pecking. There’s oil on your face. That oil will coat that groove.” They both did and the indention smoothed. “Behind your ears. In your ears is the best. Your nose too. Your neck.”

  They were ready.

  Micah showed Rebecca how to position the pl
ank so that he could step on the edge as he knelt. The spindle fit nicely into the bowl Rebecca had carved. He wrapped the yucca rope, strung between the bow, around the spindle, then positioned the rock on top and applied pressure with his palm.

  “Now the fun begins.” Micah pushed the bow then pulled it back, churning the spindle. The whole thing collapsed at the awkwardness of his motion. He laughed lightly. “We’ll need to do this a few dozen times until I find my groove and the pieces all figure out how to work together.”

  He tried again. It collapsed.

  He made some adjustments to the string’s tautness, to his kneeling position, to the string’s placement on the spindle, and to the downward pressure from his palm, and suddenly it began to spin, longer than one or two or five motions. It kept spinning and spinning with the pulling and pushing.

  Several minutes later, Micah’s shoulder burned. He hadn’t used these muscles in ages. “Here, you take a spell.”

  Rebecca positioned herself as he had and struggled to get the motion. All the forces, if not calibrated, worked against one another. Micah gave her some pointers, and soon she found the rhythm as she had with pecking the rock.

  “Foster ever tell you how he learned the bow drill?”

  “Nope.”

  “He said he was six or seven, and his father had taken him into these mountains to hunt. It was Foster’s job to make the fire—they weren’t going to have fire unless Foster could do it. His father gave him the spindle but let Foster prepare everything else. After a week of eating cold food and freezing at night, his father showed Foster how to make the spindle. Told him that the one he’d been using all week was green.”

  “Green wouldn’t work. It’s got to be dry, right?”

  “Right. When Foster carved his own and knew it was dry, it took him just a couple minutes to get the embers together. His father told him that he had to build the muscles first, so he had Foster practicing on green until he was strong enough.”

  Micah took over again, knowing Rebecca was feeling the burn from the repeated motion. As he pushed and pulled, so many memories of his mentor passed through his mind. That old Apache had saved his life more than once, and not a day went by that Micah didn’t use something Foster had taught him.