“No, sir,” Petersen admitted. “But I did make it clear that they were to bring the three deserters back alive. I stressed that fact several times,” he emphasized, hoping it would count in his favor. “They were not to harm the deserters unless the deserters resisted.”
“We can always hope,” Captain Forester said forlornly.
Almost on cue, the sentry on the northwest guard tower let out with a bellow. “Duty Officer to the main gate! The Bowdries are coming in! With bodies.”
Feeling as if his own body suddenly weighed a ton, Colonel Reynolds turned and stepped to the left so he could see the riders. They were still well off, engulfed in a shimmering haze of heat. Strung out in single file, each buckskin clad figure led another horse over which a body had been draped. Behind the riders trailed a lupine form Reynolds was only too familiar with.
An awful silence had fallen over Fort Bowie. Every last soldier had stopped whatever he was doing to watch and wait. Many wore expressions of horror and loathing. Some betrayed fear, as if afraid the same fate might befall them one day. More showed resentment, and many of them fingered their carbines or pistols.
Lieutenant Petersen was aghast. “They can’t have, sir!” he blurted. “I mean, I gave them very precise orders.”
“Rank means nothing to vermin like the Bowdries,” Captain Forester commented. “And you did give them the perfect excuse.”
“I did, sir?”
“You told them that they could fight back if the deserters resisted. The minute you said that, those poor boys were as good as dead, whether they resisted or not.”
Presently the clomp of hooves heralded the arrival of the three trackers. If they noticed the cold reception, they did not show it. Swinging wide of the detachment, they made straight for the commanding officer.
Colonel Reynolds clasped his hands behind his back and squared his shoulders. He would be damned if he would let them see how distraught he was. He would not give them that satisfaction. As they drew near, he tried to remember which one was which.
In the lead, on a mule, rode Clem Bowdrie. He favored a coonskin cap and an old Sharps buffalo gun. He also liked to wear the baggiest buckskins of any man alive. His blue eyes constantly flicked to the right and left and back again, never still for an instant. He was always as wary as a cornered cougar and three times as dangerous.
Next in line came Clell Bowdrie. The man had to be as skinny as a rail. He also had a reputation for being as tough as a grizzly. In addition to a Winchester and a Colt, he went around with a bow and quiver slung over his back. Rumor had it the bow was Cherokee-made. His brown hair hung to the middle of his back and had been fastened at shoulder height with a band of leather.
Last, also on a mule, entered Tick Bowdrie. The man was as rank as a festering sore. He liked to boast that he never, ever bathed, and anyone who came within breathing distance would not see fit to doubt him. Few, though, would have the gall to come right out and tell him that he smelled like a two-footed skunk. Not when he carried the arsenal he did.
Tick wore a pair of Remingtons wedged under his wide brown belt on either side of the big buckle. He had a Bowie on his right hip, a Colt on his left. Crisscrossing his chest were bandoleers, one for the Spencer he always carried, another for the shotgun slung across his back. Jutting from the top of his left boot was the hilt of an Arkansas toothpick. And word had made the rounds that he carried a derringer in the other boot. It was a standing joke that if Tick Bowdrie ever came unhorsed in deep water, he’d sink like a rock before he could draw a breath.
The last member of the killer clan had four paws and a shaggy coat that gave it the look of an unkempt bear. Only it wasn’t a bear. Razor, as the beast was called, was part wolf and part something else. No one knew what the something else might be, but it was safe to say that whatever it had been had to have been as big as a bear and twice as mean.
Clem Bowdrie reined up before Colonel Reynolds. The tracker did not mince words. “We’re here for our money. Fifty dollars each was what was agreed on. We’ll take it in coin money, not that script stuff.”
“Hello to you, too,” Colonel Reynolds said testily. Stepping to the first corpse, he lifted the man’s head by the hair. Despite himself, he recoiled. The mangled face was beyond recognition. “Dear God in heaven. What the hell did you do to him?”
Clem Bowdrie smiled, showing a row of small, white teeth. “Razor.”
There was no need for the man to elaborate. Colonel Reynolds glanced at the beast, which squatted on its haunches a dozen feet away, its tongue lolling, its eyes like pinpoints of infernal fire as it met his gaze and held it. “I suppose all three of them resisted?” he asked icily.
“Sure as shootin’,” Clem replied good-naturedly. “We did our best to take ’em alive, but your soldier boys was powerful determined not to be brought back.”
Captain Forester had gone over to examine the second body. He recognized Private Koch. The huge exit wound between the shoulder blades told him which of the trackers was responsible. Only a Sharps could make a hole that big.
The truth was that Forester had not liked Trooper Koch very much. The New Yorker had done nothing but complain and shirk his duty from the day he arrived. But Koch had been a cavalryman, and Gerald Forester was cavalry through and through. He would gladly give his life for any man in his command. And he could not stand there and keep his mouth shut when one of their own had needlessly died. Before he could stop himself, he muttered, “You’re a damned liar.”
Tick Bowdrie was nearest. He flushed scarlet and snapped, “I heard that, mister. You’d best apologize or you’ll regret the day you ever insulted a Bowdrie.”
Forester took a step back, his right hand inches from his revolver. He knew the Tennessean could get off at least two shots before he cleared leather, but he didn’t care. “Like hell I’ll apologize. I don’t think you tried to take them alive. I doubt you even gave them a chance to defend themselves.”
Tick started to raise the Spencer. Nearly soldiers elevated their carbines. The threat of violence hung heavy in the hot air. And at that tense moment, when frayed nerves were about to snap, Clell Bowdrie laughed.
“Now don’t this beat all! Here my kin and me do you boys in blue a favor, and look at what happens when we carry out our end of the arrangement?” Leaning toward Forester, he smiled, a smile as sinister as the look of a rattler right before it struck. “A man ought to be almighty careful of the words he throws around. If you’ll take a good look at the three we brought back, you’ll see that not a one was shot in the back.”
“That’s right,” Clem threw in, indignant. “Say what you will about us Bowdries, there ain’t a man among you who can accuse us of being no-account bushwhackers.”
Colonel Reynolds had no love for the Bowdries. In fact, he detested them. He would just as soon see their lifeless carcasses being fed on by buzzards as look at them. But he would be a poor excuse for an officer if he allowed blood to be spilled right there in the fort. Taking a stride, he plastered a grin on his face and held up both hands. “Now, now. That will be quite enough. No one is accusing you Bowdries of being bushwhackers. Lieutenant Petersen hired you to do a job, and you did it.” He indicated the headquarters buildings. “If you will be so kind as to report to the adjutant’s office, you will receive your money.” Reynolds lowered his arms. “Then you will promptly leave this post and never set foot in it again so long as I am in command.”
Clem shrugged. “That suits us right fine, Colonel. We should of knowed better than to take work for you blue-bellies. There ain’t a one of you but don’t have a tongue smeared with hog fat, and that’s a born fact.”
Colonel Reynolds was not quite sure he understood the reference to hog fat. Just understanding the tracker’s speech took some doing, since at times Clem’s high-pitched, Southern drawl was thick enough to be cut with a butter knife. And the others were little better. “Let’s just chalk this whole affair up to a tragic mistake and let it go at that,” he
suggested.
“Whatever you say, Yankee.” Clem let go of the lead rope and made for the headquarters, the Sharps tilted down so that it covered the troopers he passed. His brother fell into step behind him while the mongrel wolf brought up the rear.
Sergeant Joe McKinn waited until they were out of earshot to say, “Is it me, sir, or do they make your flesh crawl too?”
A majority of the soldiers present were staring at the three Southerners in ill-concealed hatred. Reynolds had to remind himself that the three slain troopers had friends. He would not put it past one of them to open fire. “Attention!” he thundered, and was pleased when they scrambled to obey.
“You heard the man, Private!” Captain Forester bawled at a trooper who did not react fast enough. “When you’re told to snap to, you damn well better!”
The colonel barked orders, dispersing the detachment and directing that the bodies be taken to the hospital for the time being. In the hustle and bustle of soldiers moving off in all directions, he didn’t realize until another minute went by that Lieutenant Petersen was not there.
The junior officer had pivoted on a boot heel and stormed after the Bowdrie brothers. He was beside himself with fury that they had taken advantage of him and made him out to be incompetent in the eyes of his commanding officer and half the command. The trio were dismounting when he reached them. “I want a word with you,” he announced.
Clem Bowdrie looked at him in amusement, which only fueled Petersen’s anger.
“What can we do for you, soldier boy?” the Tennessean asked.
“It’s what you didn’t do that counts,” the lieutenant responded. “I wanted those troopers brought back alive. I made that perfectly clear at the outset. Yet you saw fit to haul them back over a saddle.”
Tick snickered. “We’ve just been all through this with the head of the pack. We don’t hardly need to explain ourselves to no cub.”
Clem laughed and went to turn away.
Something inside of James Petersen snapped. Without thinking, the officer grabbed the tracker’s shoulder and spun the man around. Almost instantly the muzzle of the Sharps was jammed up under his jaw and the hammer clicked back. Tick and Clell also trained their rifles on him. And the wolf crouched, growling deep in its chest, ready to spring.
Lieutenant James Petersen froze. He was a blink of an eye away from dying, and he knew it.
“No man lays a hand on me, mister!” Clem Bowdrie rasped. “Not unless he’s got my permission.”
Tick Bowdrie moved in, his Spencer leveled. “I ought to put one into your gut for that, blue-belly, so you’ll die nice and slow.”
“No one touches Clem,” Clell interjected fiercely. “No one. Not ever.”
Petersen’s mouth was so dry that he could barely speak. He swirled his tongue a few times, then coughed out, “I meant no harm. Lower your guns.”
“Like hell,” Clell said. “Back in the hills we’d kill a man for what you just did.”
A new voice intruded, a voice with the ring of authority. “But you’re not back in Tennessee, Mr. Bowdrie. You’re on my post, and what I say goes. So you will ease up on those hammers right this instant, or so help me God, not one of you will leave Fort Bowie alive. Not even your mongrel.”
Colonel Reynolds had rushed over with Captain Forester, Sergeant McKinn, and half a dozen troopers in tow. He was taking no chances with men like the Bowdries. Six carbines and two pistols were trained on them. All he had to do was snap his fingers and they would be riddled where they stood.
Clem Bowdrie was no fool. His smooth features relaxed and he let the Sharps drop to his side. “Don’t get your britches in an uproar, Colonel. All you have to do is hand over our money and we’ll be out of your hair. And believe me, you’ll never see us here again.”
Reynolds glanced at the two brothers, who were much more reluctant to obey, but did. “I hope you will take this in the spirit in which it is meant,” he said severely, “but nothing could please me more.” He had seldom been more earnest. Reynolds couldn’t wait for them to get off the post and out of his hair where they could do no more harm and cause him no more problems.
Or so the colonel thought.
Five
The roan went lame a day out from the Chiricahua Mountains. It surprised White Apache since he had not pushed the animal very hard. He reined up in a gully, checked its leg to verify it could not go on, and made the best of the situation by promptly slitting its throat.
Gathering dry wood did not take long. Soon White Apache had a fire crackling and a dripping slab of horse flesh on a makeshift spit over the leaping flames. He had not eaten a full meal in days and was going to indulge himself.
As an added treat, White Apache dug up small roots about the size of gooseberries and roasted them. Cuchillo Negro, a member of the renegade band, had taught him how to find the plant which produced the roots and many other tricks of surviving in the wild.
White Apache was careful to build his fire under a cottonwood so that the little amount of smoke it gave off would be dispersed by the limbs. He felt perfectly safe. After all, he was in the middle of nowhere and had not seen another soul in days.
But unknown to him, a mile to the northwest a cavalry patrol led by Captain Oliver Benteen was on its way back to Fort Bowie after making a wide sweep of the western approaches to the Chiricahuas.
Captain Benteen had been on the frontier slightly over a year. Originally from a poor section of Philadelphia, he had entered the Army to get some schooling and see some of the country. He had no intention of making the military a career. In another two years his enlistment would be up and he planned to return to Pennsylvania and settle down.
Which explained why Benteen had a reputation for being overly cautious. Of all the officers under Colonel Reynolds, he was the one least likely to engage renegades if he felt the enemy had the advantage. He claimed that he was only concerned for the welfare of the troopers under him, but his peers and his superior knew better. Captain Oliver Benteen was concerned for his own hide above all else.
Colonel Reynolds knew this. But he overlooked it. The colonel would much rather have an officer be too cautious than be too rash. The headstrong officers were the ones who got men needlessly killed.
And Benteen was highly competent. He discharged his duties better than any other officer at the post with the exception of Gerald Forester. To his further credit, he was also well liked by the Apache scouts since he was one of the few officers who treated them as equals. Whenever he had patrol duty, nearly every last one would volunteer to go along and he would have to pick the warrior he wanted.
On this particular patrol, the honor had fallen to a Jicarilla known as Antonio. In keeping with Apache custom, he never told the white-eyes his Jicarilla name, only the name by which the Mexicans called him. He was an older warrior, pushing fifty winters although he had the build and stamina of a man half his age.
Antonio had joined the Army as a scout for the same reason most Apaches did; reservation life had been unbearable. He had craved some measure of the adventure and excitement he had known before the coming of the whites. And the only way to do that, short of turning renegade, was to become a scout.
Now, as the patrol crested a knoll and rattled down the slope toward an arid plain, Antonio’s eagle eyes were drawn to the southeast. He studied the sky a few moments, then slowed so the officer could catch up.
Captain Benteen was riding beside his sergeant, a tough Irishman named Shawn O’Grady. They had been debating the merits of a certain schoolmarm in Tucson when Benteen saw his scout rise up and peer into the distance. From experience he knew what that meant and he immediately spurred his chestnut abreast of the Jicarilla.
“What is it, Antonio?”
“Little smoke,” the warrior said in his heavily accented English. Pointing, he clarified its meaning in case the white-eye did not appreciate the difference, “Mean Indian fire.”
Benteen nodded. It was common knowledge that whit
e men were notorious for making their fires much too big, while Indians always made their fires small. “How far off is it?” he asked.
Antonio raised his hands and imitated shooting a bow. “Twenty flights of arrow. No more.”
Captain Benteen glanced back at the twenty-eight troopers under his command. After two weeks of patrol they were all tired and dirty and keenly looking forward to getting back to Fort Bowie. But they had a job to do, and do it they would. Whipping his arm in an arc, he gave the order to advance at a trot. Sergeant O’Grady relayed it down the column and in moments the patrol was racing across the plain, Antonio in the lead.
Unaware of this development, White Apache hunkered over the roasting meat, savoring the aroma. There had been a time when his stomach would have churned at the notion of eating horse meat. To Apaches, though, it was a staple. A warrior never grew attached to a horse because he never knew when he might have to eat it. Since joining Delgadito’s band, he had partaken many times.
White Apache’s stomach growled. Impatient to eat, he drew his Bowie and carved off a fist-sized chunk. Hungrily he sank his teeth in deep and tore off a mouthful. Even half raw it tasted delicious. He wolfed the first bite and took another.
For over a minute White Apache chewed lustily. Flies were gathering around the dead roan and he could hear their buzzing clearly. He also heard a lizard slither through the brush to his left. Then, off in the distance, so faint that he almost missed it, a bird squawked.
White Apache paused in the act of tearing into the meat and glanced to the northwest. Once, he would have taken the sound for granted and figured a roving wildcat or some other animal had startled the bird. Not anymore. An Apache never took anything for granted.
A red hawk soaring high over the mesquite to the west caught White Apaches eye. He watched it closely. He saw it bank to the northwest and make a series of loops as if examining something below. Moments later it veered off and climbed steeply, streaking due west.
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