The Ladies of Sutter's Fort

by Jane Toombs

  Diego waited. Dark clouds drifted overhead. A hawk circled. Still he waited. Finally he stood up and, leaving her on the ground, walked back the way they had come and stood there peering for a while.

  “Your friends have gone,” he told her when he returned. He gripped Selena under the arms and lifted her to her feet, shoving her against a boulder whose edge cut into her back. Without a word he brought his palm stingingly across her face, then hit her again with the back of his hand.

  The blows spun Selena around. When, briefly, he unbound her hands she flew at him, trying to reach his eyes with her nails. He grasped her wrists, one in each hand, then took them both in one hand, bringing them down in front of her. He looped the rope around her wrists, the fibers biting into her skin as he tied her hands together. Diego removed a long looped rope from his saddle, tied it to the rope on Selena’s hands and then to the saddle itself. Then he mounted and set off along the narrow track, pulling Selena behind him. The gag in her mouth stifled her cries.

  She was forced to follow his horse, her bare feet stinging. Diego stared ahead as though concerned only with keeping to the trail. When they crossed a meadow where the grass was cool and soft underfoot, Selena ran forward, clutching at his legs with her bound hands. He shoved her away and spurred his horse. She fell to the ground. As the horse dragged her, her dressing gown caught on a branch and ripped open.

  Now Selena tried to stand so she could run to keep up with the trotting horse. But she could not get to her feet, so she let herself go limp, closing her eyes as the horse dragged her forward. Diego stopped. He dismounted, walked back to her and yanked her to her feet.

  She opened tear-misted eyes to look up at him. Her wrists and shoulders throbbed with pain. She could no longer feel her feet. With his fingers Diego brushed her hair from her face. She thought she saw his eyes glaze over. Remembering? Then he was mounted again and she was stumbling along behind him.

  After what seemed an eternity, he stopped. They were on a rise. When she looked into the valley below them she saw, on top of a knoll on the far side, a cabin with a thin trail of smoke rising from the chimney. The cabin’s roof sagged. A trapper’s cabin, she thought, built before the gold rush. Perched on top of the knoll, with the trees on all sides cut away to leave only protruding stumps, the cabin was situated like a small castle on the crest of protecting cliffs. Other than the smoke, there was no sign of life.

  Diego put his fingers to his mouth and whistled a shrill bird-like call. There was no answer from the cabin. Diego whistled again. Now from the cabin came a coyote’s howl. Diego grunted and moved on into the valley.

  Selena staggered behind him. Her feet were raw and bleeding, and her wrists, shoulders, sides and breasts all ached. Her breath came in panting sobs. With her sight clouded by pain, she had to hold to the rope to guide herself.

  Diego dismounted in front of the cabin, untied the long rope, but left her hands tied and the gag in her mouth. Selena blinked, trying to clear her vision as the cabin door opened. She saw a man with a rifle in one hand. At first she didn’t recognize the short, heavily bearded man. His hair was unkempt, his red flannel shirt soiled.

  And then she knew who he was. Harry Varner.

  Diego nodded to Varner and, when the other man stepped aside, pulled Selena after him into the cabin. He led her to a bunk, turned her and pushed her down on her back. She could think of nothing except the pain radiating from her feet, up her legs and through her entire body.

  She must have fainted. When she opened her eyes she saw Varner and Diego facing each across a table and eating. Intent on their food and drink, they were not speaking. When Diego finished he stood up and without a word left the cabin. A few minutes later Selena heard him ride away.

  Varner walked to the bed and stared down at her. “So this is the whore of Babylon,” he said easily.

  He began breathing hard. Thinking he was about to strike her, Selena shut her eyes and turned her head away. The next she knew his footsteps were receding and she heard the cabin door close. She opened her eyes. Varner was gone. The cabin, she saw, was small, half the size of the one in Hangtown. Her eyes widened. Pamela. Rhynne. Were they all right? Surely Diego had taken them from the cabin before he fired it. He must have, she reassured herself. But had he?

  She saw Varner’s gun leaning against the cabin wall just inside the door. She flexed her numb fingers. Yes, she could move them. Could she hold the gun with her wrists tied? Was the gun loaded? It must be. Could she pull the trigger? She thought she could.

  Selena swung her legs from the bed, raising herself to a sitting position. She put her feet on the floor and screamed from the pain, though the sound was muffled by the gag. Tears flooded her eyes. She looked down at her swollen feet. They were smeared with blood, puffed and purplish.

  She lay back on the bed. A moment later, Varner came into the cabin carrying a bucket of water. After a few minutes she heard the kettle steaming on the stove. What was he doing? She almost didn’t care, so great was her agony.

  Varner walked to the bed. He picked her up by the knees and swung her around so her feet were off the bed and she was sitting up again.

  “Put your feet in,” he told her. She looked down to see a pan of steaming water on the floor next to the bed. She hesitated. Varner grasped her ankle and put her foot in the water. Selena, moaning with pain, jerked it out. She tested the water, finally putting both feet in.

  Varner knelt beside her. Using a wet cloth he gently washed the dirt and sand from the wounds on the soles of her feet. She sat on the edge of the bed taking deep breaths as the heat of the water soothed her.

  “Just as Jesus allowed the sinful woman to anoint his feet,” Varner said, “so I will anoint yours.”

  As Selena stared down at him he repeatedly dropped the cloth in the pan and washed her toes and her insteps. He raised her torn gown to wash her ankles. His words and tone frightened her more than if he had threatened her. His hands on her feet frightened her. Was he mad? Had the burning of his store deranged him?

  She glanced frantically around the cabin, saw two calico-covered windows, the table, the black stove, the rifle leaning next to the door. Was this to be her prison—with Varner her jailer?

  A call from outside startled them both. Selena held her breath; Varner stiffened and dropped the cloth into the pan of water.

  The call came again: “Hooo-eeee.”

  Varner clumped to the door, picked up the rifle and went to the only window at the front of the cabin. He looked through a rent in the curtain.

  “It’s Jack Smith of Howard,” he said more to himself than to Selena.

  Selena, sitting on the bed with her feet still in the water, felt a stir of hope. Jack Smith of Howard. She knew him as a miner, an old-timer in the district. How could she forget that name?

  “What might you be wanting with me, Jack Smith of Howard?” he called.

  The other man’s voice came from a distance. Selena pictured him sitting astride his horse at the bottom of the knoll looking up at the cabin.

  “Have you seen three men? Californios. They made off with the girl Selena this morning. The singer at the hotel.”

  “That I haven’t,” Varner said.

  “Have you seen anyone?”

  “Nary a soul. I’ve got the miseries, had ‘em all week, and I’ve been at the cabin all morning. Anyone riding in these parts, I’d of heard ‘em.”

  “If you see them or get word of them, see the news gets to Rhynne in Hangtown, The whole town’s up in arms.”

  “That I will, Jack Smith.”

  If Smith left, Selena knew no one else was likely to ride to Varner’s. Why would they suspect Varner? She would remain his prisoner. For how long? For what purpose? She must make her presence known.

  Unable to stand, she swung herself around so that her feet were on the bed and her hands hung over the side. She reached for the pan. Her fingers gripped its edge, and she raised it until the water ran across the floor and into the cr
acks between the boards.

  She looked up at Varner, who was still talking to Jack Smith of Howard. He wouldn’t kill Smith and herself. He wouldn’t dare. Selena swung her arms and sent the pan spinning across the room. It clattered against the far wall.

  “What was that?” she heard Smith ask.

  Varner looked behind him into the room. When he saw Selena sprawled half off the bed and the pan next to the wall, he smiled. Still smiling, he turned to Jack Smith. “Just my dog,” he said. “Critter upset some pans.”

  She heard Jack Smith answer and then she heard him ride off.

  Varner came back into the cabin. After he leaned his rifle against the wall he went to the stove. He picked up the kettle and carried it across the room, took the pan and refilled it.

  Coming to the bed, he placed the pan on the floor. She cringed away. He lifted her bound arms and swung her around so her feet were over the edge of the bed. Kneeling beside her, he once again began tenderly to bathe her feet.

  Chapter Sixteen

  King Sutton kicked a stone and sent it skittering into a gully. They had lost the trail. Sutton had sent four men, two on each side of the original track, to look for signs. So far three of the four had reported back. They had found nothing.

  The fourth man rode in from the south.

  “No luck, colonel,” he said to Sutton. They had started calling him “colonel” when they elected him their leader. As though the title gave them more confidence in him.

  Jed pointed toward three horsemen approaching up a long slope, a blue-coated army officer in the lead. As the men drew near, Sutton saw that the officer was a lieutenant. He was about thirty with a short black beard and a campaign hat shading his eyes.

  When Sutton rode to meet him, the officer reined in and the other two men stopped a short distance behind him.

  “Lieutenant Sherman,” the officer said, “at your service, sir. We rode out from Coloma to offer our help.”

  “We’ve lost their trail,” Sutton admitted. “Followed the tracks of their horses up from Hangtown to a mesa a ways back, then lost them here on the rocks.”

  “I’ll see what I can do,” the lieutenant said. He rode to where the rest of Button’s party waited. There were five of them, the slave Jed, Danny O’Lee, Doc Braithewaite and two others. Rhynne was back in Hangtown coordinating the search.

  “I’ve done a bit of tracking in my time,” Sherman said. “What do you know of these bandits? The reports reaching Coloma were sketchy.”

  Sutton repeated Rhynne’s description of the early morning raid.

  “I can tell you’re a southerner, sir,” Sherman said when Sutton had finished.

  “I’m proud to say I hail from Georgia.”

  “A fine state, Georgia. I hope to have the opportunity to go there someday.”

  “You’ll be made most welcome, lieutenant. I only trust you’ll be able to come in time of peace, not war. I’d hate like hell to have to fight you.”

  The lieutenant nodded. “My sentiments exactly, sir.”

  They joined the others and Sutton led them back to the last trace they had found of the fleeing horsemen. Sherman dismounted, knelt beside the trail and studied the hoof print while Sutton watched.

  “I was taught the little I know of reading sign by an Arapaho,” Sherman told him. “I never completely mastered the art, but I can tell whether a horse is shod or barefoot, whether he ran or walked, and whether he’s ridden or wandering loose. I try to recognize the difference in tracks. The worn heel of a boot, the size and cut of a moccasin, the curve to a horseshoe.”

  “What do you see here?”

  “If I’m not mistaken the horse is a stallion or gelding from a rancho near Monterey, probably ridden by a woman who passed this way an hour ago.”

  Sherman stood and faced the men waiting on their horses. “By your leave, colonel,” he said to Sutton. He had heard the men use the title and hadn’t questioned it.

  “Of course, lieutenant,” Sutton said.

  “Dismount and form a line,” Sherman told them. “We’ll spread out like a skirmish line and sweep to the east with no man more than twenty feet from his neighbor. Look for droppings, snapped twigs, disarranged branches, bent grass.” He turned to Sutton. “You and I will hew to the middle,” he said, “with the men on either side of us. If that meets with your approval, sir.”

  Sutton nodded.

  As the men formed a ragged line, the lieutenant said to Sutton, “The Indian who taught me to read sign could tell from an indication as small as a single blade of grass the direction a man or animal was headed and the time, within an hour, when he had passed. I’ve heard of Indians studying the insect markings in a track to judge how old the track was. I’ve never credited that story myself.” He looked to right and left, then raised his arm and signaled the men forward. They tramped past the spot where Sutton had waited for his outriders, dipped into a ravine and up the far side, and crossed a series of rain-washed gullies.

  As Sutton walked, his eyes to the ground, he rubbed his cheek where Selena’s nails had raked his face, remembering the young girl’s passion on the day Esperanza killed herself. Excitement rose in him. He desired Selena more than he had ever desired a woman before. He wanted to conquer her, to tame her, to make her his alone.

  Hanging was too good for those three Mexicans. The bastards. If he had his way, and he meant to, he’d strip them to the waist and give them thirty-nine lashes each and when they thought their pain was ended he’d give them thirty-nine more. Only then would he hang them. Not with the quick clean jerk that breaks a man’s neck. No, he’d haul them slowly off the ground and let them dangle until they strangled to death. Even that lingering death was too good for them.

  On Sutton’s right, Danny O’Lee plodded doggedly ahead, his lips moving slightly as he walked. He was praying. Asking God to save Selena, to let her be found unharmed. Danny had made a rich strike. In Hangtown they’d hailed him as a brave man after he saved Pamela and Rhynne from the burning cabin. Yet, without Selena, the money and the praise were as ashes in his mouth.

  Should he offer to say the rosary twice over every night for as long as he lived if Selena was returned safely? Danny decided not to make the offer. “You don’t make deals with the Almighty,” his father had once told him. Sherman held up his hand. The party halted, hands on guns, waiting while the lieutenant angled off to the right. He was back in a moment.

  “Only some Digger squaws,” he said. “No use questioning them, they’ll tell us nothing.”

  As they went on, Sutton saw a number of Indian women in a nearby meadow. They had work baskets suspended from their backs, held on by thongs of leather across their foreheads.

  “Gathering plant seeds,” Sherman said. “They mix the seeds with pounded acorns and grasshoppers for bread.”

  Sutton grimaced but noted that the younger squaws were quite attractive with their firm bare breasts and slender legs.

  “Ho, lieutenant. Look here.” It was Doc Braithewaite.

  “Stay where you are, all of you,” the lieutenant shouted when two of the men started to veer on toward the doctor. “I’ll take a look first.”

  Sherman knelt beside Braithewaite to study the horse droppings. Farther on he discovered a single hoof print.

  “The same shoe as before,” he said to Braithewaite. He signaled the men in. “We’re back on their trail,” he told them.

  They returned to their horses and, as they mounted, Sutton saw a rider coming from the direction of Hangtown.

  “It’s Jack Smith of Howard,” Braithewaite said when the man drew nearer.

  “Any luck?” Sutton asked Smith as the rider reined to a halt.

  “None.” Smith spoke more to the lieutenant than to Sutton. “I rode through the diggings to the east. They haven’t seen hide nor hair of them. I even went by Varner’s place. Nobody there ‘cept him and his dog.”

  Sutton nodded. “We lost their trail but now we’re onto it again,” he said. “Thanks to
Lieutenant . . .” He turned to the army officer. “What did you say your name was, sir?” he asked.

  “Sherman. William Tecumseh Sherman.”

  Rosita and Ramon rode slowly up a creek into a ravine where crags rose on both sides of the trail and an occasional stunted pine grew among the rocks. They stopped near a freshet, watered their horses, then hobbled and muzzled them. Following Joaquin’s orders, they had thrown off their pursuers on the mesa. Now they prepared to wait for his return, their flanks and rear protected by the high hills on both sides of their camp.

  After they ate, Rosita splashed through the creek and began climbing the bank on the far side. Ramon took his rifle and zigzagged his way up the near slope. When he reached an uptilted shelf of rock he lay prone with his body concealed behind a jumble of boulders.

  Below Ramon, the valley narrowed like a funnel as it entered the ravine. He was in a good spot. He looked along the sights of his rifle to the creek bed directly beneath him, then slowly swung the gun up past the scattered boulders in the ravine to a pine grove at its entrance. Far beyond the pines lay Hangtown.

  He waited. He saw Rosita scanning the trail from her hiding place among the rocks fifty yards across from him. Suddenly she tensed. When he followed her gaze back along the trail he saw a wisp of dust in the distance. The dust grew to a cloud.

  Not Joaquin then. From the size of the dust cloud he knew there must be at least eight riders. He smiled to himself. He and Rosita could hold this position against a hundred, at least till dark. And then they would slip away.

  He watched the riders approach at a lope and, as they drew closer, recognized the blue U.S. army uniform of the lead horseman. Ramon felt his heart pound in his chest. His brother, Jorge, had been one of los ninos killed fighting the Americans at Chapultepec. Jorge had been sixteen.

  How had their pursuers found them? Ramon wondered. He had clouded their trail well. He frowned. Joaquin, when he came, would be angry. Ramon shrugged. Time for that later.