Jamie cast her a fiercely warning glare; Nalte barely glanced her way. They entered Nalte’s dwelling.
“What are they doing now?” Tess demanded. “Negotiating,” Jon said briefly.
She started to shiver. Nalte didn’t need to negotiate. He could kill Jamie and ke~P her. He had all the power. He could do anything he wanted to do.
“There’s no hope!” she whispered.
Jon set his hands on her shoulders.
“Courage, Tess. There is every hope. Nalte’s little sister begins her puberty rite today. The rite goes on for four days. The woman over there will be her sponsor. She is of impeccable character, and she will stand for the sister. The man there with the buffalo horns upon his cap and the white eagle feathers, he is the shaman, the medicine man, and he will add the sacred religion to the ceremony. The girl is dressed for her role as White Painted Woman or White Shell Woman, a sacred maiden and one of the most important of the Apache supernaturals.
She will pray to the sun. The dancers with the headdresses, they are the Gan, or Mountain Spring Dancers.
It is an expensive ceremony, but Nalte is a great chief, and he has supplied much for his sister’s rite. The Gan dancers symbolize the four directions.
They are elaborate.” Tess watched the dancers as they prepared for the day.
They were painted black and white, and they carried huge fan racks and wore buckskin kilts. They carried wands. On their arms were trailers made of cloth and eagle feathers. Their huge masks had false eyes. The fan racks portrayed snakes and other creatures.
She shivered, grateful that Jori was there to assure her that the dancers were involved in a ceremonial rite and were not preparing for war. She looked into his green eyes and realized that he had kept talking to ease her mind from worry, and she was grateful to him.
“He must be furious to be disturbed today!” she whispered.
“He is not disturbed. He will make his decision quickly,” Jon told her.
An Apache warrior emerged from Nalte’s tent. He spoke briefly with Jori and took Tess by the arm.
“Jon!” she cried.
“Go with him,” Jon ordered her.
“He isn’t going to hurt you. I’m wan led with Nalte. And you are not.”
She didn’t want to let Jon out of her sight, but he moved away resolutely, and she had no choice but to accompany the warrior who took her by the arm.
Seconds later she was thrust into an empty tepee. The fire that had burned in the center was nearly out. On rocks beside it were corn cakes and dried meat. She hadn’t been told she could, but she was alone and she was starving, so she helped herself. She had barely bitten into the food when she became so nervous she couldn’t chew. She set the food down and began to pace.
After a while she sat again and looked sadly at her tender and torn feet.
They would never be the same again.
Moments later, she heard a rush of air. She catapulted to her feet, staring toward the opening of the tepee. Jamie was coming in. She gasped softly, then raced toward him, flinging her arms around him.
He quickly untangled himself, staring fiercely into her eyes.
“We’re going to get out of this. If you can manage to behave.”
“Behave!”
“Listen to me!” He shook her so hard that she felt her teeth rattle.
Indignantly she tried to jerk away from him, but his grip on her was firm and he wasn’t letting go. “You’re hurting me!”
“I’m hurting you! We’re in the midst of a fiasco like this” — “It wasn’t my fault!”
His jaw twisted hard.
“I know. It wa~ mine. For being so damned determined to try to understand you.
She felt the color drain from her face. The planes of his face seemed very lean and hard. He was more bronze, tauter. There was a fresh scar upon his cheek. She wanted to touch it tenderly, but he was holding her with too great a vigor. And the smoky anger in his eyes told her he did not want her touch.
He had come for her. He had survived both yon Heusen’s guns and his fight with Chavez to come for her. But now she realized that he had come only because he considered himself responsible for what had happened to her. She paled, trying to pull from his grasp, but he wouldn’t let her. “The puberty rite for Nalte’s sister will last four days. He will not attend to any other business during that time. Jori and I are to be his guests. You are to stay here, do you understand me?”
“Just stay here … for four days?” she whispered.
“Can’t I be with you?”
He swore, vehemently.
“You were purchased, Tess! Damn it, don’t you realize that? And not for your talents with a newspaper.”
“Jamie, don’t you start with me” — “No, don’t you start with me,” he said heatedly.
“You can manage yourself, and you can manage a lot, and you probably are a damned good rancher and newspaper woman. But if you try anything here, Tess, we’ll both probably die. Do you understand? We’re walking a very narrow line here. I’ve tried to explain von Heusen to Nalte.
He has a sense of honor; there is a chance he will return you. But I can’t do-any of this if you interfere. Do you understand?”
She wrenched free of him at last. His hands fell upon his hips and his hat brim tipped over one eye, yet she could still see the silver glint in the other. She swung around and walked with her shoulders stiff and straight, then she sat Indian fashion upon a blanket roll. She mustn’t let him see how hurt she was.
He didn’t say anything else to her, but started to turn to leave. She couldn’t stand that, and called out to him.
“Jamie!”
“What?” he demanded impatiently.
“What” — She paused, licking her lips. “what happened to Chavez?”
“He’s dead,” Jamie said flatly.
“And the Comancheros” — “The Comancheros never saw me,” he said.
“But if we’re going to get out of the mountains, we’re going to need an Apache escort. So don’t create problems.”
“Me!” “You,” he said succinctly, and he was on his way out again.
“Jamie!”
“what now?”
She hesitated a second.
“Thank you. Thank you for coming after me.
Thank you for risking so much.”
“You don’t need to thank me. I owed you this.” This time he stayed, staring at her. But she couldn’t speak anymore because sudden tears were welling behind her lashes and threatening to spill over on her cheeks. He owed her this. He had come for her because he owed her. She had dreamed that he was falling in love with her.
Maybe she was proving to be too much trouble. She had traded half her land for a hired gun. But she had never told 231 her hired gun he was going to have to go after Comancheros and Apache as well as von Heusen’s men. I’ll member to thank Jon,” she said coolly.
“He didn’t owe me anything.”
“You do that,” Jamie told her. But still he didn’t leave. He stood by the entrance, and she sat across from him, her knees crossed, her shoulders and back-very straight, her hands resting upon her knees. The distance between them seemed immense, and yet she felt the touch of his eyes as if it was fire.
It was he who spoke. ~this time, lightly, softly. “Tess?”
“What?”
“Did—did any of them—hurt you?”
She knew what he meant. Her cheeks burned and her lashes fell over her cheeks.
“David was a monster, and he probably would have killed me. Jeremiah wasn’t so bad—he wouldn’t let David touch me. I was sorry to see Jeremiah killed.” Her voice faded slightly.
“Especially the way he was killed.
And Chavez. Well, you know about Chavez, because. because you were there.”
“Yes, I know about Chavez. What about Nalte?” She shook her head.
“He let me be. Because of his sister.”
She started, hearing the long, ragged
exhalation of his breath. She thought, for a moment, that he would cross the distance between them and take her into his arms. He did not. She could scarcely breathe, longing to leap to her feet once again. But he had already set her from him. She wasn’t going to touch him again.
“You’re still Nalte’s,” he told her harshly. She gazed at him, wondering what he meant. Then she realized that he would not touch her until he had completed his negotiations with the Apache chief.
He didn’t say any more. He swung around and left, and she knew that even if she had called his name then, he would have left her.
The day wore on endlessly. Tess could hear the ceremonial drums beating and the chants of the puberty rite, but she could see nothing, and she was involved in nothing. She tried very hard to be patient, and to understand that everything rested upon negotiation.
Late in the afternoon, Jon came in. She almost leaped into his arms, but he was carrying a dish of food for her. He set it down, and she did hug him, fiercely. “Eat,” he told her.
“You may need your strength.”
She nodded and sat and looked suspiciously at her bowl. “What is it?” she asked.
“Something exotic and Apache,” he told her, “beef. Probably, from cattle taken in a raid. You should not worry.
The Apache are very finicky about what they eat. They will not eat snake, for they believe that the creature is evil, and they will not eat evil meat.
Here they are close enough to the plains to seek out the buffalo. They also hunt deer, antelope, elk and bighorn. Their food is quite safe, I assure you.”
She flashed him a quick smile and ate the beef with her fingers. It was delicious.
“How does the ceremony progress?” she asked. “The gift has been taken to the ceremonial tepee with her shaman. She has knelt down on the buckskin and lain prone to be massaged by her sponsor, and she has run in the four directions. Tonight she will dance in the ceremonial tepee, and others will dance in the center of the village.”
He paused, looking at her.
“I am leaving tonight. Nalte will not let you go until this ceremony is over, and we think it is important that I hurry to Wiltshire with the news that you have been found.”
“Oh!” Tess said, setting down her bowl and staring at him. Then she moved across the tent and hugged him close.
“I don’t want you to leave. I’m so afraid for you.”
“The Apache will see me past the Comancheros, as they will do for you if they choose to let you go.”
“If” — “Whenl” he assured her.
She pulled slightly away, staring into his deep green eyes and feeling as if she had found a friend she would cherish all her life. In his buckskins he appeared very much the Indian, but his words were those of the white man who knew her society and understoocf her fears.
“Oh, Jon, be careful!” she pleaded with him. “I’m quite sure he will be.”
Jamie’s deep drawl startled them both. Tess stood quickly. Jon came to his feet more slowly, staring at Jamie.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt,” Jamie said drily. He ducked beneath the flap and was gone.
Tess instinctively ran after him.
Jon caught her before she could leave.
“You cannot go to him!” he ordered her hoarsely.
“He has explained to you.
You are still Nalte’s. You remain here, untouched, until a decision is made.
“But he—he misconstrued what he saw!” Tess wailed. Jon offered her a dry smile.
“Perhaps he deserved to, eh?” She didn’t smile in return, and he hastened to reassure her.
“He is my friend, and I am his. He knows we said goodbye and nothing more.” He didn’t let her answer, but gave her a quick squeeze.
“I’ll see you in Wiltshire,” ” he whispered, then he was gone.
And she was left alone. Outside the light was fading. Darkness was coming, and despite the summer heat of the day, the night was coming with a chill.
Tess shivered and wrapped her arms around herself, staring miserably at the center of the tent where the fire burned no longer.
Jamie walked almost blindly into the growing darkness of the night.
Soon, the evening ceremonies for the young girl would begin, but at the moment, there was a lull as preparations were made. This puberty rite was one of the most important for the Apache. It was a structured society, a social one, and respect and honor were tremendously important.
The anger that seethed through him lightened for a moment as he thanked God that Nalte happened to be an exceptionally honorable man. Nalte had known when he first bargained with yon Heusen that the man who intended to sell a blond woman to him had to be somewhat of an outcast in his own society. But he had not imagined the things Jamie told him. Jamie explained that yon Heusen had made war on Tess and had tried to make the people around him believe it was the Comanche or the Apache who had car- tied out the raids.
That had infuriated Nalte, and it had almost given him Tess.
Almost. Nalte wasn’t quite ready to let go.
Jamie clenched his teeth and his fists as he hurried past the circle of tepees and into the night. He wanted to reach the stream, to bathe his face in its coldness.
Yet even when he reached the stream, the water could do nothing to soothe him. He could not forget Tess’s eyes-huge, violet and luminous upon his.
She had been so straight and rigid, and yet she had seemed so very small and vulnerable when she had talked to him in the tent. She had explained the past few days with a simple dignity, and he had been so relieved to discover that she had received a minimum of abuse that his knees had gone weak. He had wanted to wrap her in his arms and promise her everything would be all right, that no one would ever hurt her again.
But he hadn’t been able to do that. He couldn’t make any promises. He didn’t even dare touch her lest the emotion or the passion tear him apart and lead to Nalte’s fury. But he had never hungered more deeply inside for her.
She was always fighting; she was always strong. She had endured so much that she could be no less than strong. And yet now she had that air of vulnerability about her. She did need him. And he wanted to be all things to her.
He splashed more water on his face, and his temper cooled. He owed Jon so much—and not his anger. Yet he had been angry, seeing her trustingly in his friend’s arms, seeing the tears in her eyes, the emotion within them. He wanted her. He wanted her in his arms.
He closed his eyes, and saw again the picture of the young woman with the luminous violet eyes and the soft storm of golden-red hair falling over her shoulders and down her back. So quiet and still, and somehow achingly soft in the bleached white buckskins. There’d been a strange serenity about her, a serenity she could not possibly be feeling. He’d felt impotent to be just standing there talking to her. He was her gun, her hired gun. He’d said that he’d protect her, but he hadn’t been able to. Others had descended upon her, and she had endured fear and suffering at their hands. He’d been praying for a miracle. Praying that she hadn’t been so abused that he’d never manage to live with himself again.
He’d never felt good about killing a man. Never. Not during the war, not after. But he’d wanted to kill yon Heusen’s men when they had taken her.
He’d wanted to do more than kill them—he’d wanted to tear them limb from limb and watch them die in horrible agony. Chavez had taken that away from him. For the good of his soul, maybe it was just as well. It was hard for a man to live with that kind of hate. He knew. He’d watched it fester in his brother Cole, and it had nearly cost him his wife, Kristin. Then there had been Chavez.
He’d never seen Chavez, except from the mountaintop. And watching the Comanchere shoot the men in cold blood had kept him from feeling the least remorse when Chavez had fallen beneath his blade. The fight between them had been cold, both men knowing that it was life or death. Jamie had been a little quicker, and Jon had managed to come around with the hors
es before the Comancheros knew that their leader had been visited, much less killed. The bound woman on the bed had never moved, and she hadn’t seen anything. They were done with the Comancheros—for good, he hoped.
He smiled suddenly. He would have to ask Tess how the woman had come to be bound and tied on that bed. It would surely be an interesting story.
But when they had fled the Comancheros camp, Tess had been nowhere to be seen. They had tracked the trails up and down all night, calling softly to her. He hadn’t been willing to admit that they had helped her elude the Comancheros only to send her into the arms of the Apache. But Jon knew the territory, and he knew something of Nalte. And in the end they had decided that the only way they could deal with the chief was to lay their cards on the table. Jamie was going to have to count on his reputation with the Indians. Jori would change into his buckskin attire to approach Nalte first, then Jamie would ride in. It had been risky for them both. The Apache were a warlike people, and Nalte was known to hate the white man. But he had a reputation, too—one for upholding his own sense of honor and hospitality.
Besides, it was obvious from the out skim of the village that some big ceremony was going on, and a chief like Nalte didn’t usually like blood on his hands during such an occasion.
And so they were here, and still waiting. Darkness was falling upon the water. The moon glittered gently upon it, and the easy melody of the running water was gentle.
It was a beautiful sight, this valley within the beginning of the fierce mountain ranges.
A beautiful place to die, Jamie thought.
Nalte had promised his decision about Tess as soon as the festivities for his sister had ended. Jon seemed to believe that the Apache chief had already determined he would return Tess, at some cost, of course, but he would return her.
But what if he did not?
Apache Summer Page 22