The breeze touched her, but it was not enough to offset the heat. Her right foot felt numb. Carmela sighed and shifted her legs. A few tattered clouds hung far in the west. She didn’t suppose they would bring rain. She dozed off again.
Sometime later, she awoke. She jerked her head upright, aware of an ache in her neck. At the same moment, she heard hoofbeats.
She shrank instinctively, hoping to appear small. Would this mean rescue or terror? She hoped Dix hadn’t caught the horse and come back. Unless, of course, he intended to unshackle them and help them get to civilization. With the escaped prisoner, a pack of robbers, and a band of marauding Indians in the area, she couldn’t hold much hope for anything good.
She held her breath, peering toward the sound. It came from the direction of the craggy mountains, not along the rough road they had traveled. Perhaps she should play dead.
Too late. A brown-and-white horse was walking toward her, and on its back sat a rider. Carmela caught her breath and stared at him. An Indian, probably an Apache. He wore his hair loose, with a strip of cloth knotted about his brow, and he sat straight on the horse’s back. He was magnificent. Carmela couldn’t look away. He halted his mount just yards from her and sat for a moment, studying her.
The man swung his leg over the horse’s withers and hopped down, landing lightly on his feet. He walked closer to her. Carmela trembled as he stood over her. He took her chin in his hand and frowned at her face.
She had nearly forgotten her tattoos. Could he tell at a glance they were fraudulent?
He spoke in low tones, a guttural language of which she understood not one syllable. She stared up at him hopelessly and shrugged, giving her head a little shake. He lifted her right hand and examined the handcuffs then keenly eyed the deputy. McKay was still out cold, and the badge on his chest glimmered in the sun.
The Indian spoke again and drew his knife, a long, cruel-looking blade.
Carmela gasped. “Please don’t!”
Their eyes met, and the warrior gazed calmly at her for a long moment.
“Please.” She hated the quake in her voice. “Please do not kill us. Some robbers left us here. I didn’t do anything, really. A bad man put the handcuffs on me.” She looked into his dark eyes, wondering if he understood.
He pulled McKay’s arm up by the chain, and with his knife, made a slash in the air above the deputy’s wrist.
Carmela’s throat felt as though a boulder had taken up residence in it. This Indian would cut off Mr. McKay’s hand in order to free her. And then what? Would he take her with him on his big paint horse?
She shook her head. “No, no! Please, don’t do that. Don’t hurt him. He’s a good man. He wouldn’t mean you any harm, I’m sure.” She pulled their chained hands to the ground and covered McKay’s with her own. She looked straight into the Indian’s eyes. “No.”
He frowned and straightened then walked to his horse. She didn’t believe for an instant that he would just ride off. She watched but couldn’t tell what he was doing. Rummaging at something tied to his saddle, perhaps, which in itself surprised her. Didn’t all Indians ride bareback?
He came back with soundless steps, carrying a leather bag about as large as a five-pound sugar sack. He thrust it into her hands. Its plumpness and the give when she squeezed it told her it was full of liquid. A water skin. She had seen them on their wagon train so many years ago, when her parents were alive.
The warrior pushed it gently toward her and nodded firmly. He walked back to the horse, leaped astride, and trotted off down the trail.
Carmela sat still, watching until she could no longer see him or the horse. Heat waves wriggled above the ground where he had passed. She listened until every whisper of hoofbeats faded. Tears flowed down her cheeks.
“Thank you,” she whispered. She fumbled with the skin and found a plug. It wasn’t a cork, but perhaps some dried cactus or yucca stem. She held the skin carefully and opened it then took a drink. The water tasted heavenly. She swished the second sip around to moisten her dry mouth.
McKay. She poured a little water into her free left hand and carefully dribbled it over his lips. He stirred and moved his mouth. She gave him a little more. He didn’t awaken, but she was encouraged. Maybe a little more sleep was all he needed.
She plugged the opening in the water flask and set it down between them then lay down on the ground with her arm over her head.
Had she made a huge mistake and doomed them both to die? She couldn’t think it would have been better to let the Apache mutilate McKay and leave him bleeding to death in order to save herself. They had a small amount of water now, perhaps a quart. She would make it last. She refused to think what she would do if McKay didn’t wake up.
Chapter Five
Freeland woke, aware of the hard ground and pain in his head worse than when he’d tried to clean out Bill Halpern’s saloon and one of the Mexican rowdies clobbered him with a tequila bottle.
He struggled to sit up, his left hand hindered by those confounded handcuffs. The skin on his face and the back of his hands burned. He blinked in the blinding sun.
Someone spoke. A woman. He scrunched his eyes tight shut, which hurt, and then opened them cautiously. One impression overcame all the others. He was no longer cuffed to Dix. It was that girl, the one with the tribal tattoos. Miss Wade.
“What happened?” His own voice sent a searing echo through his skull. He reached up to cover the place that hurt worst, hauling her arm along by the chain.
“We were attacked,” she said.
“I know that.” He started to nod and thought better of it. Best sit still while he lightly explored the bump that had risen just back of his temple. “Where’s Dix?”
“He went off to try to catch the horse the outlaws left behind.” She shook her head slightly. “How much do you remember?”
“Not much after the heist and us putting stuff in their sack.”
“It was right after that,” she said. “They started shooting again.”
“Dwight.” Freeland lifted his chin and looked around. “They got him, didn’t they?”
Miss Wade nodded. “Him and the shotgun rider both. They’re lying over there.” She pointed with her free hand. “I thought you were shot, too.”
“Something hit me,” he hazarded.
“I’m guessing it was that Dix fellow. He’d got my uncle’s derringer, and he made me take your key and set him free. Then he tricked me.” She cleared her throat. “I’m sorry to say he tricked me and hitched me to you with the handcuffs. I’m sorry. I should have been more alert. But my uncle …”
Her uncle. The older, dandified man. Freeland wiped his hand across his eyes. The sun hung in the sky, more west than east. Four o’clock, maybe, and they’d been attacked just before dawn. He’d been out for hours. He studied her troubled face.
“Your uncle was shot when we were still in the stage.”
“Yes.”
He looked around again. “Is he dead?”
“I don’t know. The bandits drove off with the stagecoach.” She picked up a squishy leather bag and held it out. “Here. You must be thirsty. Have a drink of this water.”
He took it and stared at her. “Where did this come from?”
She hesitated. “It was the oddest thing. An Indian came riding down out of those Superstition Mountains and gave it to me.”
Freeland frowned. “An Indian?”
She nodded. “I don’t know who he was or where he was going. But he left us that.”
“That is odd. Did he say anything?”
“Not that I could understand.”
“He wasn’t one of the people you lived with before?”
After a moment’s silence, she said, “No. He took out a knife, and I may be mistaken, but I thought he was going to cut your hand off to get me free of you.”
Freeland stared at her. “I slept through that?”
“I’m afraid so. I begged him to leave you be, and he gave me the water s
kin and rode off.”
“Well, I never.” Freeland fumbled with the plug and tipped up the skin, letting sweet water run into his mouth. Not cold but so refreshing. He lowered it and put the plug back in. “Thank you. For everything. It seems I owe you my life.” He couldn’t imagine living without his right hand, if he survived something like that. More likely he’d have bled out on the sand. Whoever found poor Tom and Dwight would have found him, too, with his hand severed. They’d probably think Dix did it to get away from him.
“So Dix hightailed it?”
“That’s right. Left us here to die of thirst.”
“And your uncle?”
“He was still in the stagecoach. I had told one of them he was in there, that he needed me, but … I think he was the one who got shot in that last fray. They tossed him in the stage and drove off with him and Uncle Silas both.”
“Could be they had a surprise when they got to their hideout and found out they had an extra passenger.”
“Yes.” She gazed off toward the trail. “He was carrying a lot of money. If he doesn’t die from his wound, they’ll probably kill him for that.” Tears rolled down her cheeks.
“Someone will come looking for us,” Freeland said. “When they do, I’ll contact the marshal, and we’ll get up a posse to go after them. Maybe it won’t be too late for your uncle.”
“Maybe.” She didn’t sound hopeful.
He looked down at the water skin that rested on the ground between them. He picked it up and studied the fringe at the bottom and the beaded strap sewn to one side.
“This looks like Apache work.”
“Probably so,” she said.
“You don’t speak their lingo?”
She shook her head.
“Well, I’d say we’re lucky to be alive, on several counts. First the road agents, then Dix, and then the Indian.”
“So, what do we do now?”
He looked around. “We head for the next station and hope someone’s there. Going back won’t do any good.”
“How far?”
“I’m guessing ten or fifteen miles.” He glanced at her and then away. “I don’t suppose you know where the key is, or you’d have unlocked us.”
“Dix took it.”
“Right. This could be embarrassing, but, uh … well, we’ll have to take care of some business.”
“Business?”
“Aren’t you uncomfortable?”
“Oh.” Her face was already sunburned, but it deepened even redder. “I … yes.”
He nodded. “Figured as much. We’ll have to find a place where we can each be on opposite sides of something—a rock or a bush, maybe. And I promise I won’t look.”
After a moment’s silence, she said softly, “Can you wait until it’s dark?”
“I don’t think so.”
She sighed. “Me either.”
Carmela trudged along beside McKay, determined not to slow him down. He looked awful, with his burned face and peeling lips. She supposed she didn’t look much better. They’d been walking for an hour since tending to business.
She’d hated to leave the dead men lying exposed, but Mr. MacKay had pointed out that they had no shovel to bury them with and nothing with which to cover them.
“We can send men from the next town to recover the bodies,” he had said. He took the driver and shotgun rider’s personal effects. Carmela shuddered, remembering.
“You all right?” he asked.
“Yes.”
With the sunset came a cooler breeze. The western sky they faced held ribbons of pink where the clouds caught the dying rays of the sun. They deepened and spread as she watched.
“The Lord gave us something pretty to look at,” she said.
He followed her gaze. “He sure did.”
The bits of pink and vermillion in the sky darkened to purple. Carmela walked on. Her throat was parched, but she would not ask for more water. She knew he was trying to conserve it until they found a stream or some other source. A cactus wren winged above them, zooming down to her chosen cholla. From her previous travels and her study of books and pamphlets of desert flora, Carmela knew that was one plant not to be touched. Though it looked like a harmless shrub, its piercing spines would leave painful wounds. The little bird had its nest there, and the cactus protected it from predators.
When the last of the beautiful colors had been replaced by twilight, she could barely make out the rough trail. She shivered. The cooler temperature she had longed for had come. Now her burned skin was shocked by it.
“It’ll get cold before mornin’,” McKay said.
“I expect so.”
They walked onward in silence for a long time. Because of the handcuffs, Carmela couldn’t even hug herself or rub her arms. Her dark blue cotton traveling dress had absorbed the heat all day, making her perspire and fear sunstroke, but it had kept the direct sun off most of her skin. Now it offered little warmth, but neither of them had additional clothes they could layer over what they wore. The deputy was shivering, too.
“We should rest,” he said at last. He looked around, and she stood beside him, waiting for him to make a decision. Darkness had fallen, but because of the bright moon, past half-full, and the canopy of glittering stars, they could make out the shapes of rocks and bushes.
“There.” He lifted his hand toward a small tree that grew several yards off the trail.
She trudged with him toward it and sank down at the base of the tree. He sank to the ground beside her. Carmela leaned against the bole and sighed.
“What sort of tree is this?”
“They call it velvet mesquite.”
“Of course. The Indians eat the pods.”
“Yes. Squirrels and other animals do, too.”
She nodded. “I’d forgotten.”
He offered her a drink from the water skin, and then they sat in silence for a few minutes. Carmela sensed him watching her. She would feel flattered if it weren’t for her disfigured face. People always stared at her out of curiosity.
“So, you are the captive girl. The one who spoke in Tucson.”
“Yes. Carmela Wade.”
He nodded. “I’m Freeland McKay. You can call me Freeland if you like.”
She wasn’t sure whether she wanted to or not. “Is it a family name?”
“No. My mother heard it somewhere and liked it.”
“I see.”
“So, where were you captured?”
“I’m not exactly sure. The tribe moved around a lot. I was … recovered west of Yuma.” Even as she said the familiar lines, she hated herself. Liar. But Uncle Silas had come there to retrieve her and take her home with him, so perhaps it wasn’t quite a lie to say she’d been recovered. “My … my parents died in the Sand Hills area. At least that is what the authorities told me. I was quite young, and I didn’t keep track at the time.”
“Of course. They weren’t Apache though.”
She said nothing. She and Uncle Silas had gone round and round over what tribe she had supposedly lived with. In fact, in the early days she had stated on more than one occasion, at his insistence, that she had been captured by a band of Apache and enslaved by their tribe. Then her uncle had decided it would behoove them to say she’d been with a smaller and lesser known tribe. And McKay knew she didn’t understand the Apache language. She felt trapped. And wicked.
She said nothing.
Finally he spoke again. “Think you can sleep?”
“Maybe.”
They settled down, and Carmela stared up at the stars. She usually slept on her side, but she couldn’t do that without either facing him or dragging his arm over her if she faced away from him.
If they spent much time this way, forced into an intimacy neither of them wanted, he would learn the truth. She was sure of it. She wanted to pour it out now and expunge the guilt of lying to him. But she had lied to thousands of people. If he learned that, would he arrest her?
Lying was not a crime, she su
pposed, unless you were under oath in court. But defrauding people, that was certainly against the law, and she had a strong conviction that she and Uncle Silas had defrauded many, many people. Everyone who paid money to hear her story had been cheated.
McKay stirred and shifted a bit without touching her, but the chain tugged a little at her wrist. So he was awake, too.
“Why was Mr. Dix arrested?” she asked softly.
He lifted his head and peered at her in the shadows.
“He killed a woman.”
Startled, Carmela turned toward him and pushed herself up on her elbow. “A woman? His wife?”
“No. A girl at the dance hall in Tucson.”
She thought about that for a minute. “And you caught him yourself?”
“Yes. He’d left his horse at the livery, and I caught up with him there. Somebody ran and got me as soon as it happened, so I got to him before he could ride out.”
Though she was exhausted, Carmela found it impossible to sleep. Scenes moved through her mind like a play performance—Dix killing the dancing girl, McKay chasing him down and arresting him, then back to the mysterious Indian who had given her the water, and beyond that to the attack on the stagecoach. She closed her eyes and begged God to let her stop remembering so she could sleep, but still she remembered.
After perhaps an hour, McKay said, “You awake?”
“Yes.”
“We should move on. Maybe we can make it to the next station before morning. It’ll be hot again then.”
She rolled to her knees. McKay put a hand beneath her elbow and boosted her to her feet.
“Do you think we’ll be able to get out of these handcuffs there?” she asked.
“I surely hope so. Are they hurting you?”
“It’s chafed my wrist a little, but that’s mostly because of my sunburn, I think.”
“Yeah, I got a little of that myself.”
He didn’t ask about her feet, and Carmela wasn’t about to reveal how sore they were. She had thought these were good sturdy shoes when she bought them and would last her for years, but they certainly weren’t made for a twenty-mile hike across the desert. She clenched her teeth and set out at a slow but steady walk.
My Heart Belongs in the Superstition Mountains Page 5