Evelyn hunched against Buttercup, her chin tucked low. She did not like getting wet unless she was taking a bath. It had been a pet peeve of hers since childhood. Her brother once teased that she must be part chicken, since when it rained, the chickens huddled in their coop and clucked irritably. You must have hatched out of an egg, Zach had said with a grin. I can’t wait to see you flap your wings and fly. He was always saying silly things like that. God, how she wished he were there. Zach would ride up to those men and shoot them dead and that would be the end of it.
A vivid streak rent the heavens, and a tree not a hundred yards away was blasted in twain. The thunder was deafening.
Buttercup whinnied and shied, and it was all Evelyn could do to hold her. ‘There, there,’ she said, stroking her horse’s neck. ‘Take it easy. I’m here. I won’t let anything happen to you.’
‘What I do to help?’ Dega asked.
‘Hold on to the bridle,’ Evelyn said. Buttercup might shake one of them off but not both.
Dega did so, and smiled. ‘Next time I want see mountain sheep, beat me with rock.’
Evelyn laughed. She appreciated that he was being so helpful and considerate. ‘You sure are something, you know that.’
Dega worked that out in his head. Of course he was something; he was a person. Was there more to it? ‘Am I good something?’
‘Very good,’ Evelyn said, and looked down at the ground so he would not notice her expression.
With a tremendous crash and a screech, the storm unleashed it full fury. The rain became a deluge, the wind an invisible behemoth that pummeled the earth mercilessly. Except for the lightning flashes, the sky was as black as pitch.
Evelyn could not see her hand in front of her face. She held her Hawken in front of her, pressed close, trying to keep it from getting wet.
Dega had never experienced a storm like this. The rain was ice cold. The wind whipped his breath away. The din from the thunder assaulted his ears. He recalled Shakespeare McNair saying once that the weather in the mountains was more severe than in the lowlands. McNair had been right.
Evelyn lost all track of time. It might have been an hour, it might have been longer, when she detected a lessening of the downpour. The clouds went from black to gray. She was further encouraged when the wind momentarily died. The worst was about over.
That was when Evelyn heard a sound she could not account for. A rumbling different from the thunder. It came from the mountain above. She gazed up the gully, perplexed. The sound troubled her. She felt that she should know what it was.
‘What that be?’ Dega asked.
‘Maybe a rock slide high up,’ Evelyn speculated. The next instant a roiling, seething wall of water twenty feet high came hurtling around a bend, sweeping away everything before it.
Thirteen
Flash flood.
How many times had Evelyn’s father warned her about them? In the mountains, sudden rainstorms had the potential to transform every dry wash, gully, ravine and gorge into raging rivers in the blink of an eye. Many an unwary animal, and careless human, had found that out the fatal way.
Now, as the seething wall of water bore down on them, Evelyn knew they would not get out of the gully in time. She frantically tugged on the reins but Buttercup could not climb the slippery slope fast enough. In seconds the water would reach them. Her eyes met Dega’s. He was pulling on the bridle, trying to help. ‘Run!’ she cried. ‘Save yourself!’
Dega did the opposite. He reached for her hand. ‘Get behind horse,’ he said, refusing to abandon her.
Barely were the words out of his mouth when the wall of water slammed into them. Buttercup squealed as she was swept off her hooves.
Evelyn tried to hold on to Dega but the brutal force of the water ripped her from him even as she was lifted off her feet and propelled down the gully as if shot from a canon. A liquid cocoon enfolded her. She managed to suck in a breath of air, and then she was under water and flung with irresistible force like a twig in a torrent. End over end she tumbled, losing all sense of up and down. Rocks and limbs struck her again and again. A boulder half as big as Buttercup went hurtling past her head. She lost sight of Buttercup, and of Dega. The roar of the flood filled her ears, the water filled her nose and seeped into her mouth. Her lungs strained for air, but she grit her teeth and willed her mouth to stay shut.
A tree loomed, and she narrowly missed it. It meant the water had carried her out of the gully and into the forest. At any moment she might be dashed to pieces. She twisted, trying to swim, but the water would not be denied. She was helpless, at the mercy of capricious fate.
Evelyn thought of her father and mother, and of Zach. She might never see them again. Her father would find her body, of that she was sure. She was sorry for them, sorry that she would cause them sorrow.
She glimpsed something in front of her. Another tree, maybe. Before she could react, she smashed into it. Pain racked her. Then came a blow to the head, and the brown of the water began to fade to black.
I am dying, Evelyn thought.
Then there was nothing.
Her first sensation was of warmth on her face.
Evelyn opened her eyes and blinked against the glare of the late afternoon sun. She went to turn her head and almost cried out. A throbbing pain reminded her of what had happened. Gingerly carefully, she looked to each side.
She was on her back in a field of mud. Here and there were pools and puddles of water. The clouds were gone; the sky was clear. She had been out for hours.
Ever so slowly, Evelyn rose onto her elbows and looked down at herself. Her dress was soaked and caked with mud and bits of grass and leaves. She still had her ammo pouch and powder horn, but her pistols and her knife were gone. She moved one leg and then the other. Nothing appeared broken, but she hurt in several places.
Something was poking her in the back. Evelyn eased to one side, and grinned. She had been lying on her rifle. At least she had a gun, even if it would be of no use to her until it dried out and she reloaded.
‘Dega?’ Evelyn sat up. He was nowhere to be seen. Neither was Buttercup. Apparently she had been swept through the trees and deposited in a meadow. They might not have been as lucky. She started to stand, but her legs were wobbly. Reluctantly, she sat back down to wait for her strength to return.
Evelyn bowed her head and closed her eyes. Everything that could go wrong had gone wrong, but she must not give in to panic. Her parents had taught her better than that. She must stay calm and do what needed doing, and she would make it out alive.
Belatedly, Evelyn became aware of the plop-plop of heavy hooves in the mud. She glanced up, startled, and started to push to her feet.
‘Stay right where you are, girl,’ Mandingo said, training the muzzle of his rifle on her. ‘I do not want to shoot you so do not give me cause.’
Evelyn clenched her fists and glared. To be caught like this, weak and defenseless, made her furious. ‘What do you want?’
‘I think you know,’ the mulatto said, and smiled a lecherous smile. ‘I love the pretty ones, and you are very pretty.’
‘Go to Hell,’ Evelyn said.
Mandingo laughed. ‘No doubt I will. But not before I have tasted many more treats such as you.’
‘I will scratch out your eyes. I will rip out your throat with my teeth.’
Reining up, Mandingo swung a leg over one side and sat there in his saddle. ‘Sorry to disappoint you, little one, but you won’t have the chance. You’re ours to do with as we please.’
Evelyn scanned the meadow. He was alone. ‘Where are your friends?’
‘We separated to search for you and the Indian,’ Mandingo revealed. ‘We lost track of you in the storm.’ He placed a hand on a flintlock tucked under his belt. ‘Now I will signal them. They will come quick. They’re as eager as I am to partake of your charms.’
‘I have never been with a man.’ Evelyn did not know why she said that. She just did.
‘All the better,’ M
andingo said. ‘Thank you for telling me.’ He glanced toward the forest and frowned. ‘It’s a shame I must share you with the others. It’s rare I get one so young, so sweet.’
‘You will not have me if I can help it,’ Evelyn vowed, placing her hands flat beside her. She had made up her mind what she would do.
‘There is fire in you,’ Mandingo said. ‘I like that. Some women give up before I touch them. They lie there and do nothing. You will fight me. I like that better.’
‘You are right. I will fight,’ Evelyn said, and came up out of the mud so fast, she caught him off-guard. She grabbed his ankles, heaved and sent him tumbling backward off his horse. Even as he fell, she grabbed the saddle and swung up. A smack of her hand, and his sorrel broke for the woods. She felt fingers clutch at her dress, but the mulatto could not hold on. Bending low, she glanced back.
He had risen and was taking aim.
Evelyn doubted he would shoot. What use was she to him dead? But she swung onto the side of the sorrel and hung by one arm and one leg, as her Shoshone uncle Touch the Clouds had taught her when she was barely old enough to ride. She looked back again.
Mandingo had lowered his rifle and was smiling.
Evelyn smiled, too, and then she was in the trees. Swinging up, she lashed the sorrel into a gallop. But she only went a few hundred yards, then drew rein. The smart thing to do was to keep going, to get as far from the mulatto and his friends as she could. But Dega was out there somewhere, maybe hurt, maybe dying. She had to find him. It would put her at great risk, but she refused to leave.
She reined toward the gully. That was the logical place to start. She would follow the path of mud and destruction and eventually she should find some trace of him.
Evelyn shivered. Despite the sun, she was cold. She reached up to brush a stray bang from her eyes and discovered her hair was thick with mud. She must look a sight.
The woods were ominously still.
Evelyn did not relax her vigilance for a second. The men who were after her could be anywhere. She needed a gun, needed one more than anything. The thought made her draw rein. Shifting, she opened Mandingo’s saddlebags. She hoped to find a pistol or a knife, but the mulatto had all his weapons on him. ‘It figures,’ she said, and rode on.
She had a good sense of direction. She found the gully without too much trouble. But she did not get too close. The men might be watching it, too. Rising in the stirrups, she sought some sign of Dega.
The flash flood had left the gully half buried in mud and debris. When it exploded into the open, the water had spread over an area some fifty feet wide. Trees had been uprooted and tossed like matchsticks. More mud and broken trunks and torn limbs were everywhere.
Evelyn marveled that she had survived. She feared greatly for Dega and Buttercup, and braced herself for the worst. Turning the sorrel, she paralleled the flood’s path. She looked for tracks, for bodies, anything. She had been at it ten minutes when the undergrowth on the other side parted and out rode the one called Graf.
Evelyn raised her reins. She expected him to come after her, but instead he drew rein and did nothing but smirk. It made no sense. Or was it he knew he could not get across the mud quickly enough to catch her, and he did not want to spook her into riding off? He did not call out. He just stared.
Evelyn was so intent on him that she almost missed the movement to her right. A nicker from the sorrel warned her, and she turned to see Bodin moving as quietly as his horse could toward her. Already he was so close she could see the whiskers on his chin. She immediately goaded the sorrel into a trot.
‘Hold on, girl!’ Bodin hollered, and came after her.
Evelyn flew for her life. She was under no delusions about what they would do to her if they caught her. Across the mud, Graf paced her.
‘You can’t get away! You’re only making it harder on yourself!’ Bodin shouted.
No, Evelyn thought, she was making it harder for them. She was a good rider and could go for hours if she had to. If she were on Buttercup, she had no doubt she could eventually outdistance them. But the sorrel was not her horse. She did not know its stamina. As with people, no two horses were alike.
Bodin loved to yell. ‘Damn it, stop! You are making me mad!’
Evelyn counted on making him madder. On she fled, with one eye always on the mud for sign of Dega and the buttermilk. The timber became thicker, the underbrush heavier. It slowed her, but it also slowed Bodin. He did not gain any, but neither did she.
Despair nipped at Evelyn, but she fought it down. As her pa was so fond of saying, a King never gave up. She and her brother had taken that to heart. Just as they had their father’s admonition that when their lives were in danger, when it was kill or be killed, they must do whatever it took to survive.
A low limb suddenly filled her vision. Evelyn ducked with mere inches to spare. Had she not seen it she would have been unhorsed. She emptied her mind and concentrated solely on riding. So far the sorrel was holding up well. She might escape yet.
Evelyn glanced back now and then. Bodin seemed content to keep her in sight. Graf was still pacing her on the other side of the mud. She noticed there was less of it, that the flood had narrowed as its force was spent, and fewer and fewer trees were uprooted. It hit her that soon they would come to the end, and Graf would close in from the side. Maybe that was what Bodin was waiting for.
Evelyn had to lose them before then. She spied a wide thicket to her right and reined toward it. Graf shouted something to Bodin, but she did not catch what it was. Without hesitating she rode straight into the thicket, knowing it would tear at her and the sorrel, but knowing, too, that it was thick and high, and that Bodin and Graf would lose sight of her. The sorrel slowed, balking. She used the reins and her legs to compel it.
Twenty feet in, Evelyn reined to the left. She bent at the waist, went another twenty feet, and drew rein.
Hooves thudded. Bodin had reached the thicket. Evelyn imagined he was trying to spot her. Unconsciously, she held her breath.
‘Do you see her?’ Graf hollered.
‘No, damn it. Do you?’
‘You’re closer,’ Graf said.
‘She has to be in this tangle,’ Bodin yelled. ‘But it must cover an acre and a half. Get over here and help me look.’
‘But what if my horse gets stuck in the mud?’
‘Then you climb down and kick it.’
Evelyn slid off the sorrel. Holding the reins, she moved toward the opposite side of the thicket, parting the brush carefully so as to make as little noise as possible. The sorrel made more, but not so much that Bodin would hear. Or so she hoped.
‘Hurry it up! If she gets away it will be your fault.’
‘Me?’ Graf replied. ‘What did I do? I’m coming as fast I can, but my horse keeps sinking.’ He swore a lurid streak, then said, ‘Where the hell is Mandingo, anyway? Isn’t that his horse she is riding?’
‘It is,’ Bodin shouted. ‘He’ll have some explaining to do, and it had better be good.’
Evelyn wanted them to go on yelling, but they stopped. When she estimated she had gone about fifty feet, she moved faster. The crackle of the sorrel’s passage worried her, but Bodin gave no indication that he heard.
The end of the thicket was in sight. Beyond was more timber. Once she was in among the trees, she would circle toward the gully and resume her search. There had to be some sign of Dega and Buttercup. There just had to.
Up ahead, a horse whinnied.
Evelyn’s head snapped up. She smiled with joy when she beheld Buttercup. The buttermilk was layered with mud and looked done in, but appeared otherwise unhurt.
Evelyn went faster, pulling the sorrel after her, and the moment she was out of the thicket she flew to Buttercup and threw her arms around the horse’s neck. ‘Here you are! I was so worried!’
Evelyn kissed Buttercup’s muzzle and gripped the bridle. Abruptly, she saw that the reins were wrapped around a limb. Someone else had already found Buttercup and
made sure she could not run off. ‘Dega?’
A sound drew Evelyn’s gaze into the tree. Fear spiked through her. It wasn’t Dega. It was Mandingo, and even as she set eyes on him, he launched himself at her.
Fourteen
Evelyn tried to whirl and run, but she had only taken a step when the mulatto slammed into her. His shoulder caught her low in the back, bowling her over. She came down hard, her senses reeling, and managed to scramble to her hands and knees. Before she could rise, a foot arced into her ribs. The pain was excruciating. She fell flat, the breath knocked out of her.
‘That’s for taking my horse,’ Mandingo said. Evelyn looked up. He was leaning on his rifle and made no attempt to hurt her more.
‘You are clever, little one. But not clever enough. You should not have stuck around.’
‘My friend,’ Evelyn gasped.
‘You stayed to find him?’ Mandingo said. ‘You a white girl and him an Indian?
‘So?’
‘I’ve lived with the hatred of whites all my life. They’ve treated me as if I were a diseased dog just for being part black.’
Evelyn had regained some of her breath. ‘But you ride with whites.’
‘They treat me as one of them.’
‘They are bad men,’ Evelyn said.
‘Spoken like a child. There is no good and bad. That is for Bible thumpers. Life is about taking what we want when we want, about always looking out for ourselves.’
‘If that’s your outlook,’ Evelyn said, ‘I feel sorry for you.’
Mandingo frowned. ‘I don’t need your sympathy. You have not lived my life. You have not suffered as I have. I learned the hard way what counts and what does not.’
‘What do you and your friends intend to do with me?’
‘You’re not stupid. You already know.’
‘You’re worse than bad. You are wicked. Justify it as you like, it does not change the fact that you are as low as a human being can be.’ Evelyn slowly sat up, pretending to be in more pain than she was.
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