Winter Fire

by Elizabeth Lowell

He sighed. “Yes.”

  Eagerly she went to one of the pack animals and untied the shovel.

  “What are you waiting for?” she asked.

  “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather—”

  “Yes,” she interrupted impatiently. “I’m sure.”

  “Hell’s fire.”

  He went to his saddle and untied two rolled-up blankets. With a few quick slashes of his knife, he made them into thick wool ponchos.

  “Put this over your jacket,” he said, holding out one of the ponchos.

  “But—”

  “Do it without arguing. Just for the hell of it. Just once.”

  He jerked the poncho over her hat before she could object again. Their breath mingled when he bent and tugged the poncho in place.

  It hung down below her knees.

  It was warm.

  “Thank you,” she muttered.

  “You’re welcome,” he said mockingly.

  “How anyone can tell me to go to hell and never actually say the words is amazing.”

  “Shouldn’t be. You manage it with a look.”

  With that, Case yanked his own poncho over his jacket, grabbed the shovel, and set off up the jumble of debris once more.

  Sarah was right on his heels.

  Snow began to fall. The first flakes were soft and airy, swirling like apple blossoms on the wind. Then the wind quickened. The flakes came thicker and faster, clothing the land in a clean white silence.

  “We should go back,” he said as soon as he reached the top of the mound.

  “What for? Only rain is dangerous in these canyons.”

  “What if drifts pile up?”

  She shook her head. “Not here. Maybe on up in the high country.”

  “What about freezing to death?” he asked sarcastically.

  “It’s warmer now than it was before it started to snow.”

  “Hell,” he muttered.

  “At least we won’t have to worry about an ambush,” she said matter-of-factly. “You can’t see more than twenty feet in front of your face.”

  “For these small things, Lord, we are grateful. I think.”

  Case turned on his heel and looked up the south side of the canyon again. Though falling snow blotted out most landmarks, he remembered how the wall had looked through the spyglass.

  “Stay off my heels,” he said. “If I fall, I don’t want to knock you down.”

  “Does your leg hurt?” she asked anxiously.

  No, but my dumb handle sure does, he thought.

  He could still taste the heat of her startled breath when he had bent over her to pull the poncho in place. Like her scent, her movements, her simple presence, the knowledge of her warmth haunted him.

  “Just stay clear of me,” he said through his teeth.

  Twenty minutes later he levered himself up over a chest-high lip of stone. The ledge he found beyond was less than six feet deep. The overhang barely gave a man room to sit upright.

  More a crevice than an alcove, the ledge ran for about thirty feet before tapering away into a nose of rock. At one time the nose had been a tall red finger of stone, but frost and water had eaten through the softer rock at the base and tumbled the pillar into the canyon. It was impossible to say whether the pillar had tumbled yesterday or a thousand years ago.

  A low wall and several storage compartments were built into the crevice with native rock. At first glance, and even at second, it was hard for Case to be certain that the remains of the walls weren’t just random debris. The native stone naturally broke into roughly rectangular shapes that required little finishing by man to become small building blocks.

  “Are we there yet?” Sarah called up from just below him.

  “Such as it is.”

  Kneeling, he set the shovel aside, turned, and reached down to help her up onto the ledge. As he did, he spotted what looked like a twisted piece of wood poking out from behind one of the low walls. Turning his head, he looked more closely.

  The remains of a buckle were attached to the oddly shaped scrap.

  He gave a soft, soundless whistle.

  “Grab hold,” he said. “It’s warmer up here out of the wind.”

  “Are they really ruins?” Sarah asked impatiently. “Sometimes it’s hard to tell at a distance.”

  “Judge for yourself.”

  Saying nothing more, he lifted her onto the ledge.

  She crouched on the cold rock and looked around eagerly.

  “Watch your head,” he cautioned.

  The first thing she saw was something poking out from behind a crumbling wall. She reached for it so quickly that she banged her head on the low ceiling despite his warning.

  She hardly noticed. Her fingers were curled around an ancient leather strap. It had been dried to the consistency of wood by the alternating fire and ice of the stone desert.

  “Is it as old as I think?” she asked, her voice awed.

  “I don’t know. I do know that no Indian left it here. They didn’t have metal.”

  She turned and looked at him with wide, radiant eyes.

  “The Spanish did,” she whispered.

  “So did a lot of others since them,” Case said. “It’s a long way from a scrap of harness to three hundred pounds of silver.”

  But the heightened gleam of his eyes told Sarah that he was excited, too.

  She started forward to see what else might be behind the low, crumbling wall. Then she hesitated.

  Be there, she prayed silently. For Conner. He deserves better than life has given him.

  “Sarah?” Case asked, touching her arm. “Is something wrong?”

  “So many hopes,” she said simply.

  Pain twisted through him.

  “Don’t let hope get to you,” he said. “All it will do is hurt you.”

  “No,” she said. “Memory hurts. Hope heals. Without it, we would spend our life in pain.”

  Saying nothing, Case let go of her arm.

  Sarah crawled around the low wall and peered into the darkness beyond.

  Darkness looked back at her.

  She dug beneath her poncho and carefully pulled out a tin of matches. After a moment, flame leaped at the end of a tiny wooden stick.

  There was nothing behind the ruined wall but more rectangular chunks of rubble.

  Disappointment went through her like black lightning. The match burned down, flickered, and died, scorching her glove. She didn’t notice.

  For a long time she didn’t move. Then she sensed Case crouched in the gloom just behind her.

  She turned toward him.

  “There are other canyons,” he said quietly.

  Though she nodded, she made no move to turn and go. Her hand was clenched so tightly around the fragment of harness that even her glove couldn’t soften the bite of metal against flesh.

  “Were there any other ruins in this canyon?” she asked.

  “I didn’t see any.”

  “Then there aren’t any.”

  He didn’t disagree.

  “It was a long shot,” she said after a time. “There isn’t a red finger nearby. I thought maybe it came down in the last big flood a few years back.”

  “When your husband died?”

  “Yes,” she whispered. “Hal told Conner that he would never find the silver until the old ones came back and opened their hiding places, and the red finger would point the way.”

  “Did Hal talk much about his treasure hunting with Conner?”

  “He only talked about it once,” she said, “when he was dying. He was always tormenting Conner.”

  Hal baited him once too often, Case thought.

  But he didn’t say it aloud, for he had promised Conner.

  “Is this the canyon where it happened?” he asked after a moment.

  “I think so. From what I saw when I was gathering wood…” Her voice died.

  Case looked at Sarah sharply. She didn’t realize it. She was staring out at the snow with eyes that saw only th
e past.

  Suddenly she shuddered.

  “Dead man’s silver,” she whispered. “Just like you said. I’d never touch it but for my brother.”

  For the space of several breaths he looked out at the snow, thinking about the huge mound of flood debris they had climbed to get to the insignificant ruins. The fingers of red stone that stuck up all over the wild land looked permanent, but he had seen proof in more than one canyon that even stone gave way over time.

  “How far back do the ruins go?” he asked, looking into the darkness.

  “I don’t know. There’s a lot of rubble about five feet in front of me.”

  “May I see?”

  Wordlessly she crowded against the solid stone that formed the back side of the crevice.

  There was just enough room for him to squeeze by her. He set aside the shovel and eased forward. As he moved, his poncho scraped and snagged on the ragged ruins, dislodging a rectangular stone.

  The rock tumbled out of the crevice and vanished into the thickly falling snow. From the sounds that came back, the stone struck the steep side of the canyon a few times, then hit the top of the flood debris and stopped moving.

  Snow muffled all echoes with silence.

  He struck a match and looked into the darkness just beyond the fitful flame. Once the floor had been smoothed by hands long dead. Now it was buried by broken stone once more.

  Silently he measured the height of the ruins, the depth of the crevice, and the size of the pile blocking his way. Something wasn’t quite right, but he couldn’t decide what it was.

  The match died.

  He pushed forward until the natural wall of stone crowded him on one side, the man-made wall pushed him on the other side, and the rubble made a solid barrier in front of him.

  Too much debris, Case realized, understanding what seemed wrong.

  The ruined wall wasn’t high enough or wide enough to account for the heap of stone. Even if his eye had been misled by the uncertain light of the match, most of the stones that fell out of the ruins would have dropped into the canyon and vanished, as had the one he accidentally knocked loose.

  It could have been like a little stone crib for storing things, he thought. If the structure fell in on itself, that would explain a lot of the stones.

  He lit another match and studied the mound. It didn’t quite reach to the low ceiling. There might be enough room at the top for a man to look over and see what was on the other side.

  The second match went out.

  “See anything?” Sarah asked, but there was no real hope in her voice.

  “Rocks.”

  She didn’t ask any more.

  Case took off his hat and levered himself to the top of the rubble pile. Awkwardly he struck a match and peered into the inky black at the far side.

  He didn’t see anything. There just wasn’t enough room for him to look over.

  He blew out the match.

  “Get as far back as you can,” he said to her. “I’m going to shift the top of this mess so I can look over on the other side.”

  “Be careful. Some of these ruins are dangerous.”

  “Are you just figuring that out?” he muttered.

  “I’ve known since I looked at the first one,” she said indifferently.

  “But you kept at it.”

  Whatever she said was lost in the sounds of stone grumbling and scraping when he started shoving debris away from the top of the mound. As much as possible he pushed the stone away from him, into the darkness ahead.

  The rattle and bounce of debris told Case that the area beyond the barrier was open. He pushed faster. A cascade of stone ran down the far side, clunking and scraping with dull sounds.

  Then came a sound that wasn’t stone striking stone.

  “Was that your shovel?” Sarah asked.

  “I left it behind you.”

  “But something sounded like metal.”

  “Stay back” was all he said.

  He shoved more stone away from the top, pulled off one glove, and began running his fingers over the newly uncovered debris.

  Stone met his touch. Then more stone, rough and cold. Then something very cold.

  And smooth.

  He struck a match and stared at the rubble that was only inches from his face.

  All he saw was pale rectangles of rock and a few stones so dark they seemed to absorb light.

  Black rectangles? Case thought. I’ve never seen black rock in these canyons, except for veins of coal.

  Is this a stash of coal?

  Abruptly he plunged his hand into the rubble. His fingers closed around a black rectangle.

  Cold. Smooth. Heavy.

  Much too heavy for coal.

  “Case? Are you all right?”

  Distantly he realized that Sarah had called to him more than once.

  “I’m fine,” he said.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Sorting through debris.”

  “It got so quiet all of a sudden.”

  “I’m just catching my breath.”

  The match flickered out.

  Case hardly noticed. He didn’t need light to remember what the heavy black rectangle looked like.

  There was a cross carved into it.

  With an effort he managed to free his knife from its belt sheath. Working by feel in the dark, he gouged at the bar with the sharp tip of the steel.

  He lit another match.

  A teardrop of pure silver gleamed out of the black rock.

  “I will be damned,” he said.

  “What?”

  “It’s here. The silver is here.”

  Sarah made a startled sound and clawed her way toward him.

  “Move over,” she said.

  He couldn’t, but he could roll onto one side.

  “I can’t see anything at all,” she said, frustrated. “Are you sure there’s silver?”

  She struggled to dig a match out of her jacket. Crowded next to him as she was, it was nearly impossible.

  “Don’t bother,” he said.

  “But—”

  “Take off a glove,” he said over her objections.

  With an impatient jerk, she stripped off a glove.

  “Brace yourself with the other hand,” he said.

  A cold, smooth weight settled onto her palm. Like Case, she knew instantly that no stone was that heavy.

  Nor was a handful of reales.

  “Bullion,” she breathed. “Dear God. It’s a bar of silver bullion!”

  Disbelief and excitement raced through her. Her fingers clenched around the precious silver bar.

  “There are more,” he said.

  “More,” she repeated in a daze, afraid that she wasn’t understanding him. “I can’t believe it.”

  “Give me room to dig. You’ll believe it.”

  “I’ll help you.”

  “Honey, there’s not enough room for us to light a match wedged in like we are, much less dig together.”

  “But—oh, blazes, you’re right.”

  Dragging the heavy silver bar, she eased back through the tight passage. Then she crouched a step away from the base of the rubble, balancing the bullion in both hands.

  “I’ll pass the bars back to you as I find them,” he said.

  “How many are there?”

  “I don’t know.” He grunted and pushed a bar into her hand. “Start counting.”

  “Oof.”

  “Oof?” he said dryly. “I make it two bars so far. Here comes number three.”

  “Wait!”

  There was a muted, almost musical clatter as Sarah dumped the first two bars against the back of the crevice. She pulled on her glove and reached forward again into the gloom.

  “Ready,” she said.

  Another heavy, tarnished silver bar smacked against her palm.

  “Three,” she said.

  Without pausing she chucked the third bar off to the side.

  “Ready,” she said.

/>   By the fifth bar Case and Sarah established a rhythm that varied only when the silver was difficult to drag out of the rubble. Then she would rest while he muttered under his breath and lit a match and shoved rock aside until he freed more bars.

  Shivering, cold without realizing it, she waited for silver wealth to be shoved into her hands so that she could toss it aside and hold out her hands for more.

  Rock shifted, grumbled, and filled up the hole where Case had been digging.

  “How many?” he asked.

  “Forty.”

  “That’s more than we can take in our saddlebags. Especially with this added on.”

  He backed out of the hole and turned. Black coins spilled from his hands. The tarnish didn’t change the sweet chiming of silver against silver when the coins tumbled to the ground.

  “Enough to fill my saddlebags, and yours in the bargain,” Case said. “We’ll have to leave the bars for later.”

  “What about the packhorses?”

  “No time,” he said.

  “We can’t just leave the bullion here.”

  “Why not?”

  “Someone might find it,” she said impatiently.

  “Nobody has up to now.”

  “I’ll guard it. You go back for—”

  “No,” he interrupted. “Anywhere I go, you go.”

  “We can’t both stay here.”

  “Uh huh. That means we’re both going.”

  “But the rest of the silver—”

  “Better hustle,” Case said, turning back to the leather sacks of reales that lay within the rubble. “It’s going to be a hell of a scramble carrying saddlebags of silver down those snow-slicked rocks.”

  Sarah’s teeth clicked as she shut her mouth. Some of her excitement ebbed when she eyed the pile of bars and the crumbling leather bags that he was gently easing from the rubble.

  Silver was unreasonably heavy.

  Like lead.

  “What are you waiting for?” he said.

  “Wings.”

  “You’ll freeze to death first. Get moving, honey. You’re already shivering like a sick hound.”

  Clumsily at first, then more easily, she helped him get some of the bars down the steep side of the canyon, and then carry the empty saddlebags back up.

  Case wanted to stop with the saddlebags.

  Sarah refused.

  She wasn’t leaving until every last bar they had found was loaded on. She had hunted too long and too hard to leave anything behind.

  The snow had almost stopped falling by the time Case finally heaved heavy saddlebags onto Cricket’s back and buckled them in place. Sarah’s little mare was carrying her share as well.