The rope drew taut, grinding into his upper arms, and he was jerked off his feet. His back hit the ground, the air leaving his lungs with a grunt.
He looked up to see the three mule skinners circle him slowly, grinning down at him. One held an ax handle, another a shovel.
The man he'd beaten at cards held the lariat in one hand while brandishing a bullwhip in the other. He was laughing.
Chapter Fourteen
"Boys," said the man wielding the bullwhip, "what do you say we have a little fun with this breed who stole seventy-three dollars off n me down Alamosa way?"
Yakima sat up. He didn't struggle against the rope around his arms.
"Stole?" He spat dust from his lips, kept his voice jovial as he smiled up at the mule skinners. "I don't recollect stealin' anything off you, friend. I do recall you getting sore because I beat you square and plumb."
"That's your story, breed. Everyone knows an Injun can't win at cards less'n he cheats!" The man whose name Yakima couldn't quite remember stepped back and cracked the bull-whip's popper a foot from Yakima's left ear.
Yakima blinked. His smile grew taut while his tone remained jovial. "I also recall you jumpin' me with two other friends in an alley. Say, how're those ribs of yours? They heal all right?"
The other two mule skinners, wielding their ax handle and shovel respectively, chuckled as they traced a slow circle around him. The man with the bullwhip flushed and shot a dark glance at each of his partners.
"It was dark that night," he grumbled. "And I'd had more than my share of busthead. Now"—he leaned forward and cracked the bullwhip just to the right of Yakima's right ear— "I'm feelin' just fine."
The man swung the bullwhip back behind him, laughing, then slung it over his head.
Yakima raised a brow and edged his voice with menace. "One more time, and you're gonna wear that blacksnake around your neck."
"Think so?"
"Get him, Dietrich," said the man with the ax handle. "This breed here needs a tattoo on his ass." To Yakima, he said, "Son, don't you know how to talk to your betters?"
"Sure, I do," Yakima said, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he shuttled a glance to the man.
He was a squat little ranny in a green canvas coat and high-top, lace-up boots. He had a shaggy, tobacco-stained beard but no mustache. Tapping the ax handle in the palm of his left hand, he continued sidestepping around Yakima, breathing hard and grinning beneath the brim of his black sombrero.
"I just don't see anyone better than me in this yard," Yakima added, erasing the half smile from his own face.
He hadn't yet finished the sentence before Dietrich whipped the blacksnake toward him. Yakima had had black-snakes whipped at him before. Calmly, he watched the popper spin through the air, growing larger and larger as it approached his shoulder.
At the last second, Yakima threw out his arm, forcing up the rope around his chest. He closed his hand around the whip, about a foot up from the popper, quashing the crack. The pain was sharp, like a knife slice across his palm, but he did not react. Instead, he jerked the whip's rawhide handle from Dietrich's grasp.
"Jay-sus!" Dietrich barked, stumbling forward, grabbing his wrist and looking down at his wrenched right hand as if making sure it was still there.
At the same time, Yakima spied movement in the corner of his right eye. He half turned, saw the ax handle careening toward his head. He ducked, heard the handle's whistle through the air as well as the squat man's surprised grunt.
Ripping the lariat noose over his head, Yakima leapt to his feet, then jumped two feet off the ground. He twisted, set one moccasin down while the other spun high and connected soundly with the squat man's mouth.
Planting both feet in the dirt, he whipped his head around, arms straight out from his shoulders.
Dietrich bounded toward him, swinging his left fist. Yakima ducked, saw the third man swinging the shovel, and pivoted toward him.
He broke the shovel's swing with his right forearm, then jabbed the man's face twice with his fists, feeling the nose flatten beneath his knuckles. Screaming, the man dropped his shovel as he staggered back and fell to his knees, blood spurting against his face, seeping through his fingers.
He hadn't yet hit the ground when Yakima ducked another swing from Dietrich, then leapt onto the toes of his left foot and brought the heel of the other straight up and sideways.
The mocassin smashed into Dietrich's left cheek. Dietrich's feet left the yard, and he hit the ground hard on his right shoulder.
Screaming and cursing, his face pinched with red fury, Dietrich scrambled onto his hands and knees and began crawling toward his wagon. An old Springfield rifle hung on the wagon box, above a toolbox and a water barrel.
"Goddamn lousy son of a bitch of a bastard rock worshiped."
Yakima spied the bullwhip on the ground in front of his right moccasin. He picked it up casually, then reached for his Yellowboy.
Shifting the rifle to his left hand, the bullwhip to his right, he stepped toward Dietrich and flung the whip. As the black rawhide dropped toward the man, Yakima eased the handle back. The end of the whip wound twice around Dietrich's neck, squeezing like a boa constrictor.
The mule skinner's cheek bunched, and he flung his hands to his neck. "Gughhhahh!"
Yakima pulled the whip back, jerking Dietrich off his knees. He landed in the dust on his back, clawing at the whip, his eyes slitted as he strangled, grinding his heels in the sand.
Yakima dropped the whip. Dietrich got his hands under the braided leather wrapped around his neck, started working it up over his face. He had it to his forehead when Yakima, who'd sauntered up to him, Yellowboy hanging low in his right hand, thrust the end of the barrel into Dietrich's mouth.
Dietrich's eyes snapped wide.
He gagged.
His hands rose to the barrel, then lowered as Yakima jammed the barrel farther down his throat. Dietrich rose up on his heels, keeping the back of his head against the ground, arching his back.
Holding the Yellowboy firm, Yakima glanced around. Dietrich's amigos were down—one on all fours spitting teeth, the other holding a handkerchief to his bloody nose and shaking his head like a horse that had gotten into the locoweed. Already the man's eyes were swelling shut.
The old one-legged gent remained on his keg, grinning and staring at Yakima as if he couldn't wait to see what would happen next. On the porch stood the younger redhead, holding a double-barreled greener across his chest and regarding Yakima skeptically. Faith stood at the other end of the porch, hands on the railing, looking worried.
Yakima dropped his gaze to Dietrich and slackened the barrel slightly. The man's back sank to the ground as he sucked a pinched breath.
"I see you again," Yakima said tautly, "I'll kill you. Savvy?"
Dietrich stared up the Yellowboy's barrel at Yakima, then bobbed his head quickly.
Yakima removed the barrel from the man's mouth, spittle stringing off the foresight. He held the rifle low as he strode to the roadhouse, stopped at the base of the porch steps. He looked up at the chubby redhead standing there, shotgun still crossed in his arms. The redhead's eyes had acquired a wary cast.
Yakima nodded toward Faith. "That young lady will be staying here tonight. Give her a good bed, plenty of grub." He looked around at the mule skinners, all three looking like they'd just been dropped off the back of a fast-moving wagon.
Yakima turned back to the beefy redhead. "I'll be holding you responsible for her safety."
The redhead slid his eyes to Faith, glanced at Yakima, his nostrils flaring slightly, then turned and ambled back into the roadhouse, brushing past the old woman and the sandy-haired lad peering owl-eyed around the doorframe.
Yakima began walking back to where he'd left his pack and canteen. Faith's voice stopped him. He turned around as she moved down the steps and paused before him. She slid a lock of hair away from her eyes, tipped back the brim of her man's leather hat.
"The old couple i
nside have offered me a ride tomorrow."
"That's good. They look like decent folks." He smiled thinly. "I'll be seein' you in Gold Cache, then."
He turned.
"Wait." She didn't say anything for a moment, her eyes searching his. "Did you get a horse?"
"Not yet. But, like I said, I'll see you in Gold Cache."
Yakima looked around. The one-legged oldster regarded him and Faith with mute interest. Finally, Yakima looked at Faith once more, pinched his hat brim at her. "Safe travel."
Her eyes crinkled slightly. "You, too."
Yakima turned and headed back to the stock trough. Dietrich and the other two mule skinners had gathered there, splashing water on their faces, grumbling under their breath. The man who'd been wielding the shovel looked up at Yakima, wincing and showing broken teeth and bloody gums, then quickly lowered his face back down to the water.
Yakima picked up his pack and canteen, strapping both around his neck and heading east around the corrals.
He passed the Negro smithy, still working on the wagon's rear wheel. The man didn't look up as Yakima passed him and turned around the corrals, heading for a rocky knob south and east, about a hundred yards from the roadhouse and from which a single pine tree grew crooked, as though perpetually bent by the wind.
True night. Darkness had closed down tight as a drumhead.
Yakima had feasted on the trout he'd caught in the creek that angled through the willows at the base of the southern ridge. He sat atop the rocky knoll, under the wind-twisted pine. The fire snapped and popped, the flames tearing on the night wind that smelled of cold earth and snow.
Winter was on the way. Maybe only a few miles farther up the trail. The wind was especially cold tonight. His four-point capote was barely keeping it out.
Faith.
He took a deep drag from his cigarette, held it down deep in his lungs, let it go. The wind tore the smoke from his lips. Sipping tea from his tin cup, he saw in his mind's eye an image of her sitting naked in the stream, feet and pink-nippled breasts protruding above the water's rippling surface, her hands clutching the roots above her head.
He'd see her again in Gold Cache, say his final good-bye.
What else could he do? It wasn't like they had a future together. A half-breed and a whore. Still, he felt as though a dull knife were prodding him down deep in his belly.
He turned his head slightly. The lights of the roadhouse shone in the darkness, the hulking wagons silhouetted against it. She was probably asleep now, in a bed with a corn-shuck mattress and a flour-sack pillow. She would wake well rested and light out early with the old folks and the boy.
The freighters would leave her alone. They were no doubt in too much pain to try anything with a woman tonight. Still, Yakima held his gaze on the flickering lights. He'd keep an eye on the place, his ears pricked for trouble. She'd be safe as long he was on the scout.
At the same time, on the roadhouse's second floor, Faith opened her eyes. She'd only been dozing on the creaky cot. The old woman lay nearby, snoring softly, while the men snored loudly on the other side of a makeshift rope-and-trade-blanket curtain.
Faith rose onto her elbows, swept the sack curtain away from the window, and peered into the southern darkness.
There on the rocky knoll, the flames of Yakima's fire guttered—a ragged, wind-torn glow in the darkness. The bent pine was silhouetted against the stars.
Faith looked out the window for a long time.
A chill touched her, and she shuddered. Drawing her blankets up to her chin, she lay back against the pillow and closed her eyes.
It took her a half hour to fall asleep.
Chapter Fifteen
Yakima woke when his inner alarm clock rang around four thirty, the black sky still star-dusted, the air nippy, dew dappling the sage and cedars.
He drank water from his canteen—cold as snow water— and kicked dirt into his fire pit. Shouldering his gear, he peered at the dark roadhouse hunkered against the low bluffs in the north, then walked down the knoll, angling across the sage meadow to the corrals and the barn.
He crouched through corral slats and slowly pulled one of the two rear barn doors open, the warm hay smell and ammonia instantly filling his nostrils. When the opening was two feet wide, he stepped inside and to the right, so the backlight wouldn't silhouette him.
Ears pricked, he listened.
Snores rumbled softly somewhere off to his left. That would be the Negro smithy, asleep in his quarters.
Yakima stepped forward, set his gear gently in a hay cart, and fumbled around in the barn's heavy, musty shadows until his eyes adjusted enough that he found a tack room. A minute later he stepped through the back door with a saddle and blanket on his shoulder, a bridle looped over the saddle horn. He moved deliberately, trying to make as little noise as possible while thoroughly enjoying the deep, rhythmic snores.
Setting the saddle and blanket on the top corral slat just outside the barn doors, he grabbed the bridle and slowly approached the seven horses snorting and fiddle-footing at the back of the corral; six clumped around a tall, sharp-eyed stallion. The stallion would have been the perfect choice for a long, hard run, but the wild-eyed horse would probably put up a fuss and wake the big smithy as well as everyone in the roadhouse.
Yakima singled out a brown and white paint mare with three white stockings. She was ewe-necked and more than a little sickle-hocked, but the broad chest and muscular hips bespoke endurance. He clucked to the horse, ran his hands gently across her withers and down her neck, then calmly slipped the bridle over her ears, the bit into her mouth, and led her toward the barn.
He kept an eye on the stallion, relieved that the big horse seemed satisfied to bob his head and show his teeth back where the others were gathered around him like children around their mother.
Yakima looped the paint's bridle reins around one of the corral's peeled-log poles, set the blanket on her back, the saddle on top of it. He cinched the latigo and froze, his head against the paint's ribs, ears pricked at the barn.
The snores had stopped.
A deep voice thick with sleep said, "Don't forget this."
Yakima turned sharply. The big mahogany figure filled the doorway. He tossed Yakima's Yellowboy to him. Yakima caught the rifle with his right hand, then canted his head, wary.
"I'm takin' this here mare," Yakima said.
"I didn't think you were saddling her 'cause you thought she'd look purty all leathered up "
The big man's chest heaved, and there was a grating sound that could only have been a chuckle. He flung an arm forward. Yakima's pack and canteen landed in the dust before his moccasins.
The wheezing chuckle again. "You don't remember me, do you, Yakima Henry?"
Yakima looked at him. The big man stepped into the violet darkness. "We came up the Texas trail together some six, seven years ago."
Yakima squinted and then a taut grin spread across his lips. "Well, I'll be damned. Jeff Ironsides."
"I shod the horses and fed the waddies. You peeled potatoes for me, time or two." Ironsides nodded at the saddle horse. "Picked you out a fine one. Not so purty, but a stayer."
"I'll bring her back."
"Figured you would."
Yakima reached into his right front pocket. "I'll pay you a silver cartwheel in advance—"
"I ain't takin' your money, Yakima. Chances are the crippled old bastard who runs the place won't even notice she's gone. Just bring her back in one piece, and that's all I got to say on the subject."
As Ironsides opened the gate, Yakima swung into the leather and hung his canteen and war bag over the saddle horn, his rifle down his back. He gigged the horse through the gate, pinched his hat brim at the big, bullet-headed black man. "Much obliged."
As Yakima turned the horse toward the yard, Ironsides called softly, "Like I said, she's a stayer, but she needs water often and she don't see in the dark as good as some."
Yakima threw up an arm in acknowledgment,
then walked the horse through the yard, keeping an eye on the cabin in which a single rear window glowed. Faith was probably still asleep. A pang of guilt and regret for leaving her shot through him, but this was best for them both.
When he was past the last of the outbuildings, he gigged the paint into a trot. The horse clung to the trail nicely, seemed eager to run, so Yakima gave her her head, and the hooves drummed along the right track of the two-track trail.
Faith dreamed that Thornton was grabbing her by her right arm. With his free hand, he held a knife before her face, tilting the point toward her right eye, ordering her to hold still.
Teeth gritted, eyes flashing like daggers, he leaned toward her and shouted, "It'll only hurt worse if you fight me, whore!"
"No!" Faith cried, trying to jerk her arm from the road-house owner's grip.
She snapped her eyes open.
An old woman, gray hair wrapped in a tight bun, crouched over Faith's cot. The woman's eyes were wide as she held her left hand up, palm out, barely visible in the early-morning darkness. Her other hand was splayed across her bosom.
Her voice came gently. "I'm not going to hurt you, child. Just wanted to wake you. Ed said we'd be needing to pull out in twenty minutes or so."
On her elbows, Faith heaved a sigh and flushed with embarrassment. It was the old woman who'd offered her a ride. Faith's heart slowed.
"Thank you, Mrs. Schaeffer. I'll be ready."
The woman offered a kind smile, then straightened and disappeared through the blanket partition. Faith turned to the window, swept the curtain aside.
Dawn had painted a pale pink glow behind the bluffs and mountains in the east. The rise on which Yakima had camped was a black smudge, the single gnarled tree pointing like a crooked finger. No fire or any other sign of a camp. Yakima had likely cleared out well before dawn.
Faith wondered if he'd walked or if he'd somehow secured a horse.
The Lonely Breed : A Western Fiction Classic (Yakima Henry Book 1) Page 11