by Tony Masero
A shadow fell over the group and they all turned to see Tag standing there.
‘You!’ exclaimed Scart angrily. ‘You don’t aim on sticking me again, do you? ‘Cos if you is, I’ll forget myself and nail your ass to the damned wall. You hear me, boy?’
‘No, it ain’t for you,’ mumbled Tag, dropping his eyes.
‘What is it, that you interrupt us?’ asked Telkashay.
‘I have a question for the great chief Shulki,’ Tag said in Apache and taking on an attitude of humility.
Shulki looked at him, his features unmoving.
‘Will the chief hear my words?’ Tag asked.
‘Speak,’ grunted Shulki.
‘I have to come to ask of my sister. Shulki has her amongst his captives and she is in my heart and I would know of her health and circumstance.’
Shulki nodded, ‘You speak good in the Apache tongue for a white child. You have done well here, Telkashay, I think this one has spirit.’
Telkashay nodded in gratitude at the compliment.
‘I will tell you, white boy,’ said Shulki. ‘The girl lives, I have not yet given her to any of my braves. She will learn the ways of our people and one day soon she will be a bride. I will tell you this, that she is fit and in good health.’
‘Thank you, Shulki,’ said Tag.
‘What you talking about with them, boy?’ asked Scart suspiciously.
‘It is nothing, the boy asks after his sister, that is all,’ explained Telkashay.
‘Better be all,’ growled Scart. ‘Wouldn’t want that little rat playing any games behind my back. Say, chief, why don’t you let me take him off your hands? I’ll take good care of the whelp.’
‘That cannot be,’ said Telkashay. ‘He is of my people now.’
Scart shook his head and although he continued to glower at Tag he said nothing.
‘There is more?’ Telkashay asked Tag.
‘I…. I….’ Tag fumbled, wanting to know more about Eloise.
‘Enough,’ snapped Shulki, waving Tag away. ‘We have other matters to discuss.’
Tag meandered off, his heart full of discontent. His concern over Eloise was eating away at him and the frustration of not being able to see her or in some way rescue her from the prospect of an enforced integration into the tribe scratched away at his brain like a beetle in a tin mug.
If only he could find some source of help but there was none to be found. He was alone in a mountain wilderness and miles from any kind of assistance.
He thought then of Bayou Tarfay and wondered what had become of the Ranger. If anybody would have aided him, he knew the Ranger would have been the man. It did occur to him that Tarfay would still have been after the renegade Scart and it was a vague hope that some day the Ranger would come looking for the man but when and if that might be, was an undecided dream. More than likely Tarfay would be busy repairing his ranch and more concerned with his own life than any orphan children that he had been forced to care for.
********
It was true that Tarfay was otherwise occupied but not in the manner Tag envisaged.
Things in Dona Ana had certainly heated up and it was not just the warm weather that decided it. The band played and the whiskey flowed and soon jeers and catcalls between the opposing sides evolved into brawls. The army personnel had been ordered to stay outside the town and it was an accidental firing of a pistol that started the bloodshed.
Soon the guns were out and victims were falling in the crowded streets, one Republican set about a Democrat with an axe handle and beat his brains out. A nearby Mexican promptly shot the assailant and was then himself killed by gunfire. Fistfights and shootouts ensued with panic stricken women screaming and ushering their children to safety through the mayhem.
A messenger was sent racing to the General to plead for assistance and as the hullabaloo rent the night sky; the General answered the appeal with a troop of infantry on the run in an attempt to pacify the town.
Tarfay stood and watched the sky lightening as fires started and the noisy sounds of battle reached him.
He turned to the others, all of whom stood waiting with their saddles in hand.
‘It’s time,’ he said and promptly led the way out across the empty parade ground. It appeared that most of the soldiery had left their billets to go see what was happening at the further reaches of the camp and very few were left to see their departure.
As they approached the corral, only the black silhouettes of the restless ponies could be seen in the darkness.
‘Jimmy, yours is the guard on the far side. No killing just make sure he’s out of the running for a while.’
Without a word the half-breed slid off into the darkness whilst the rest of them approached the guard standing at the gate of the corral.
‘Evening boys, what’s happening over there?’ asked the guard as they came up. ‘Sounds like all hell’s broken loose in town.’
‘I guess that’s it,’ said Tarfay. ‘We come to pick up our ponies. General wants us out on a scout.’
‘Hot damn!’ said the guard, peering over their shoulders at the distant firelight. ‘Wish it was me going in there. Looks like a real good party.’
He was more interested in the noise coming from the town and paid little attention to Cornpone coming up behind him. It took two blows from Cornpone’s pistol butt to bring the man down and the quick attention of Mortimer to bind and gag him whilst Link slipped over the corral fence and hustled up some ponies for them.
Within minutes they had scaled the corral and saddled up. Jimmy joined them with a nod of success in Tarfay’s direction and that was the signal for Link to open the corral gate. With a whoop he waved his hat and flapped it in the air, leading the ponies out through the gate. At first a few balked at the prospect of freedom but soon the leaders were streaming away and the thunder of racing hooves echoed through the camp.
Tarfay and the others rode alongside running flat out for the open countryside. Men fell out of their tents as the ponies streamed through, barging and leaping as they crashed through the military lines. Dust flew in clouds and panicked cries of ‘Stampede!’ were lost in the roar of pounding hooves.
They were clear of the camp in minutes and the outlying pickets were taken completely by surprise as the herd raced by them, hardly giving a moment for reaction. Hanging low over his pony’s neck Tarfay allowed himself a grin of success as they raced out onto the open prairie. Link maintained the lead and the animals dutifully followed him whilst those riding on the fringes attempted to keep the horses together in some sort of mass, which was no easy task in the darkness.
It was only after an hour of such a race that the leaders began to let up, whinnying and stomping they slowed their sweating bodies and Tarfay and the others closed in on them.
‘Keep it tight but keep them moving,’ called Tarfay. ‘We want to lose as few as possible.’
They rode on through the night and Tarfay was fully confident that there would be a troop after them but only after the General had managed to regroup his forces and to find sufficient steeds to take up the chase. He reckoned that they had forged a good lead for themselves and if they were lucky they would be deep in Indian country by midday and far in front of any following force.
They stopped mid-morning and to do a head count and found that they had lost ten ponies in the night run but still had thirty-five of the animals to trade with.
‘This enough?’ Tarfay asked Jimmy.
‘It is good,’ the half-breed nodded. ‘Maybe three are top quality and the rest not so good.’
‘How far to the Indian camp?’
Jimmy looked off towards the blue haze of mountains on the horizon and pondered, ‘Could be two or three days.’
‘You want to scout out the way, see if you can find them?’
Jimmy nodded solemnly, ‘It would be wise.’
‘Then go ahead.’
As Jimmy rode out, Cornpone sidled up beside Tarfay, ‘You reckon that’s suc
h a good idea?’ he asked, watching the half-breed disappear into the distance.
‘Hellfire! I don’t know. This is all so damned dangerous anyway, what have we got to lose. One way or the other Jimmy is either with us or we all end up toasting over an Apache cook fire. We’ll find out soon enough.’
‘You sure are an encouraging soul, Bayou Tarfay,’ said Cornpone with a doubtful shake of the head.
‘Come on let’s keep these animals moving.’
********
The raiding band was gathering and Scart, Crome and the Mack brothers sat apart and listened to the braves joining in chant and daubing their faces with paint. The four men sat and watched with distracted interest.
‘How we going to handle this, Scart?’ asked Callum Mack, massaging his shoulder where his wound kept reopening and left his arm stiff and inflexible. ‘We can’t let this asshole take that gold; he’ll leave us with diddly that’s for sure. Might even cut our throats into the bargain.’
Scart narrowed his eyes in the gloomy pre-dawn light and watched the black silhouettes of the Indians moving about as they prepared for war. ‘Well, we sure as hell can’t just ride off with it. That’s going to be trunk loads of cash; it’ll be mighty heavy. More than we can carry in saddlebags and those beggars will be on our tails before we can get clear. No, I got another idea.’
‘How’s that work?’ Crome asked.
‘I’ll tell him I know of an old Confederate veteran in El Paso who trades in surplus armory weapons left over from the war. Won’t take much to get his mouth watering over a whole arsenal of rifles, so I’ll suggest taking a parcel of that gold and trading it for top-notch weaponry. It’s the only way we’ll get clear without getting diced into small pieces.’
‘Then what?’
Scart chuckled, ‘We just keep going, straight on to California.’
‘That’s a long haul,’ Crome frowned doubtfully. ‘Even if he falls for it.”
‘Shulki’s eyes are bigger than his belly, the way I’ll paint it he’ll be lusting over a few crates of guns before they’ve even counted out the gold. They’ll be so fired up by taking all the army wagons and gear it won’t take much to convince. Besides, if you’ve got a better notion, I’ll listen.’
‘What if they send a body of braves with us?’
‘So?’ shrugged Scart. ‘We just bury them along the way, that’s no big deal.’
‘You really think they’ll go for it?’
Scart looked over confidently at the prancing braves, ‘The way I’ll spin it he’ll just love the idea.’
A young woman came out of the darkness bearing a large bowl of cooked meat and a gourd of tiswin. She laid it at the outlaw’s feet and was about to turn away when Scart called her back.
‘I know you?’ he asked, taking in her pale features. Her hair was long and unkempt and she wore the voluminous dress and grubby shirt of an ordinary Apache maiden but she was a pretty little thing underneath Scart could see that. ‘You’re white, ain’t you?’
The girl’s face wore bitter, downturned lips and she stared at Scart with angry eyes, ‘You should,’ she said. ‘You’re the reason I’m here.’
Scart pouted curiously, ‘That so? How’d that work out?’
‘She’s the other one of them kids you let go at Tamaloosa,’ said Crome recognizing Eloise. ‘Sure, she’s the one that’s kin to that punk kid who almost jumped you, remember?’
‘My brother, Tag?’ gasped Eloise. ‘He’s still alive?’
Scart rubbed his jaw, ‘So she is, it’s her alright’ he said. ‘I do declare, that little brother of yours is something else, missy.’
‘Where is he? You’ve seen him?’ Eloise asked desperately.
‘Sure we have,’ Scart answered, his eyes roaming over the figure of the girl thoughtfully. She had filled out well, he thought. In fact, under all that Apache paraphernalia she was quite a beauty now. ‘He’s with that other buck, Telkashay. We can take you, if you like?’
‘You can! Oh, if only, but that Shulki keeps a careful eye on me, he has set all the women to watch me closely.’
‘Don’t you worry about him. Lord! We can’t have a white girl held by these savages, that’s right, ain’t it, Crome?’
‘Sure is, ain’t natural.’
‘You ain’t squaw to any of these wild men, are you?’
‘No, they leave me alone, thank God. But I reckon I’m being saved for someone.’
‘Probably the big man, it’ll be the chief wants you for his own. Now listen,’ Scart leaned forward confidentially. ‘When we get back from this raid we’ll be pulling out, you come along of us and we’ll get you back to your brother. Damned if I’ll see a white woman in this kind of predicament.’
Hope was beginning to outweigh Eloise’s suspicions about the outlaws, she desperately wanted to see Tag again, he had come to represent all her longing for home and her own people and after being cast into a pit of despair at their separation it was a spark of light in the darkness.
It had been hard for Eloise even though she had not been touched in any sexual manner, she had suffered beating and rough abuse by the women of the tribe and Shulki had cast lascivious eyes at her from the start. Early on she had feared he was saving her for himself and only waiting until she reached full womanhood. None of the other braves had dared approach her and those had tried had received the butt of Shulki’s harsh temper. Shulki’s jealous wife had been particularly spiteful as a result and tortured the girl relentlessly, forcing her to undertake all kinds of menial tasks that had left Eloise shamed and resentful.
To pin her hopes on these men was a dubious roll of the dice but she deemed that the slightest chance of escape should not be rejected. She must take her chance now as the opportunity might never arise again and the prospect of the rest of her life spent as the consort of someone like Shulki was not a thing she dared envisage.
‘I’ll do it,’ she breathed. ‘I’ll be waiting.’
Chapter Twelve
Jimmy took Tarfay and Cornpone up to a hidden spot amongst the rocks that overlooked Telkashay’s campsite. The three men slid into position on their bellies, cautiously quartering the layout of the wikiups and noting the few ponies left tied to the almost empty picket line.
‘Seems mighty quiet,’ observed Conpone.
‘It sure does,’ Tarfay agreed. ‘What’s going on, Jimmy? Can’t see nearly a brave down there.’’
Jimmy shrugged, ‘Don’t know, unless they’re out on a hunting party. They got some men watching the approach though.’
Tarfay was thoughtful; ‘Maybe it’s a good time then.’
‘What you aim on doing?’ asked Conpone.
‘I’ll take the three best ponies and go down there,’ he said. ‘Make like I’m up for a trade, that’ll give me the chance to have a better look.’
‘You sure you want to go in alone?’
‘It’ll be safe enough, one man alone poses no risk.’
‘Then we’ll cover you from up here.’
‘Sounds good, I’ll go back and fetch the three horses. Wait here.’
Leaving the two in position, Tarfay crawled away and made his way back down to where Mortimer and Link had the rest of the ponies held herded together in a small box canyon.
‘What’s up?’ asked Link.
‘Pick me out those prime horses you decided on, I’ll take them on into the Indians. The camp’s kinda empty at the moment and we’re wondering why.’
‘The two others?’
‘They got my back up in the rocks, will you and Mortimer hold on here?’
‘Sure thing.’
With the best ponies in tow, Tarfay led them in file and made his way to the head of the valley where the Apache were encamped. He had not gone far when he heard animal calls of warning echoing down the between the steep rocks of the entrance. Not a soul was in evidence but Tarfay knew that eyes were on him and he pulled up to unfasten his gun belt and hang it onto his pommel, with one arm raised high in a sign of
peace he urged his pony on again.
At the point where the entranceway opened out, three braves stepped into the open, one dressed in an army cavalry kepi and holding a Springfield rifle leveled at him, the other two carrying bows with arrows nocked in the string.
‘I come to trade,’ Tarfay called out, indicating the horses tied off behind him. ‘Where’s your chief?’
The kepi hatted Indian jerked a chin at him and answered in English, ‘What do you want, white man?’
‘Like I said, I got ponies to trade.’
‘Trade for what?’ asked the Indian, cautiously searching the trail behind Tarfay.
‘Skins, pelts, maybe gold if you’ve got any. You’ve got some good pelts, ain’t you?’
The Indians looked at each other doubtfully but their eyes ran hungrily over the fine animals.
‘Good horse?’ asked the Indian.
‘These here? Sure, the best. I got more as well back over yonder.’
‘How many men you bring?’
‘I got a whole team with the rest of the herd,’ Tarfay lied, never letting his eyes roam to where he knew Jimmy and Cornpone were watching. ‘There’s some fine army horseflesh out there.’
‘You steal ponies?’
Tarfay gave him a rueful look, ‘Now that would be telling wouldn’t it? You been a scout for the army?’
The Indian gave a short jerk of the head, ‘I am Shiska, I scout.’
‘Okay, so you know what I’m talking about. I got a lot of good animals to trade, take me to your chief and we’ll talk.’
The Apache thought about it a long silent while, then he waved the rifle and pointed the barrel towards the village, ‘Bring ponies in, we talk.’
‘You the head man here, Shiska?’ asked Tarfay.
But the Indians said nothing, merely opened out so that they covered Tarfay on three sides as he made his way into the camp.
As he rode in Tarfay noted the lack of men amongst the wickiups, women and children gathered in large numbers and silent curiosity as he was led to the center of the campsite, a clearing where the ashes of what had been a big fire still smoldered.