Commanche Vengeance Page 12

  The further south they moved, the hotter it became, and the light spring became the blazing heat of a hot summer. They had to halt regularly now to give the horses a breather. And one day during the heat of the afternoon Duke cut the furs from the animal’s backs and left them where they lay in the dust of the south Texas flats.

  They had moved down the river for nearly three weeks when they were stopped dead by a war party of Apaches that was returning with a herd of horses, and more travois dragging the dust than Duke had ever seen. There were more than a hundred mounted braves and at least that many more horses in the herd they drove, and half of them dragged booty on the tent pole travois. The dust could be seen for miles and Duke knew the Apaches would have scouts and riders out on both sides and ahead of the main party. Sarah and Duke remained where they were, not moving out of the dense thicket of brush and cactus. All one day and that night they waited for the dust to settle and the last of the Apache scouts to bring up the rear. Early the next morning the flats were clear of dust and they rode out again, beating harder trails south this time to make up for the lost time.

  On the first of June they came to the Indian village.

  “I don’t know which tipi he’s in, if he’s still alive,” Duke said, staring down at the forty-odd scattering of tents. They were protected in front by a soft, sandy ridge and down on the other side by the thickest growth of thorny brush Sarah and Duke had ever seen. They had carefully hacked out just enough room to squeeze the horses and themselves into when a rider came out of the village and passed within fifty feet of them on his way to make meat or after an escaped horse.

  Sarah had been studying the village for four days now. She seemed to see the movement in the village even when she closed her eyes at night. Four of the larger tipi were to one side. No one ever went in and they had seen no one come out. Duke guessed they might be medicine lodges or store lodges, and had suggested a plan where they might sneak into one of the larger tipi at night and at least pick up some of the talk. But Sarah would not allow him to go alone and Duke refused to let her come with him.

  Hour by hour they lay in the hot sun and watched, retreating to the brush thicket when meat parties came out of the village and returned.

  On the morning of the fifth day, their water began to run out.

  “We have to do something, Miss Sarah,” Duke said quietly. “We can’t stay here much longer.”

  Sarah bit her lip. “You think we might be able to trade with them and find out for sure if he’s there?”

  “We wouldn’t get within sight of the first tipi,” Duke said. “Remember, we sent a few of their menfolk to the happy hunting grounds when they had us before.”

  Sarah nodded. She was at the end of her patience. She could readily see that it would be simple to get out, but it had taken careful watching and planning to get into the cover of the brush thicket without being seen. They might not be able to get back in.

  “You got any suggestions, Mr. Duke?” she asked softly.

  “I still say that getting into one of them big tipis will give us a chance at information.”

  “But only if we both go.”

  “No,” Duke said flatly.

  Sarah sighed. “Then we better pull out of here. The horses are going to need water tomorrow and we haven’t got any to give them.” She studied the ground between the sand ridge and the nearest of the big tipis. “I’ll take the first watch, now, and you’ll take it tonight. I’m getting tired quick these days. I guess I’m not as strong as I thought I was.”

  Duke glanced at her sharply. In the entire time he had been with her, he had never heard her suggest that she be given special consideration. In fact, Duke often thought of her as a man when the chores were to be done.

  He slipped off the ridge and dug in deep beneath the brush, cursing under his breath when he moved accidentally into a sharp thorn. The horses had long ago learned it was better to stand perfectly still rather than move around in the confined area of the hollowed out brush. They turned to look at Duke slipping into the clearing and turned back to their nuzzling of the short grass that grew in the protected shade.

  Throughout the entire time they had been studying the movement of the village, Sarah had noticed one outstanding characteristic. When a meat-making party left at sunrise, they usually returned late in the afternoon and the entire village came out to greet them. Braves’ squaws, old men and women, children and dogs all swarmed around the returning hunters. When the hunters were gone for several days, the greeting was even larger.

  She had seen a large party leave the village the second day they began their watch on the Indian community. If her judgment was right, and the meat party returned that day, they would try and get back before dark.

  Sarah settled down to wait, hiding her eyes in the crook of her arm to avoid the midday sun, moistening her lips with as little of the precious water as was necessary.

  She glanced down at the thicket below her constantly. The lower the sun dropped, the more concerned she became about Duke’s waking up. If he woke before the hunting party returned, her plan would be stopped.

  She drowsed in the hot sun. She closed her eyes and watched an old squaw build up her fire, and then turn to stare into the east. More and more of the Indians began to stare into the east, as if waiting for someone.

  At last Sarah saw them returning. She breathed a silent hope that their hunt had been a huge success so that the festivities would be wild.

  She saw the Indians before the villagers did because of her elevation. She strained her sun-weary eyes to see if they carried meat and felt her heart skip a beat as the figures of walking braves unfolded in the distance. They had killed so much meat they chose to walk back, bringing the slain buffalo and deer on the backs of their ponies.

  The closer they got to the village, the more tense Sarah became. She knew she would have only a few minutes. She had seen the squaws go after the meat before, fighting their way to be first at the select cuts of beef and hurry to the fire and begin cooking it. But there was something else that Sarah was counting on. When the braves returned, the first thing after eating, they would grab their squaws and disappear into the tipis, emerging a while later to eat more.

  The party was within sight of the village now. The children and younger boys began to run out and ride out to greet the returning hunters. The squaws too ran out and shouted to the men, and to each other. Their loud laughter and squeals drifted up to Sarah and she waited, tensed up like a rattler ready to strike.

  The village was nearly deserted now. The squaws were fighting over the meat, pulling the dead, bloody beef from the ponies’ backs and letting it fall to the ground, where they attacked it with knives and bare hands.

  Sarah moved over the ridge, open to the eyes for miles around and to every single Indian in the village if they turned and glanced in her direction.

  She raced down the side of the sand ridge and dove for the bottom and a clump of brush. It was five hundred feet to the nearest or the huge tipis and she began to work her way forward, crouched low and running fast, the carbine in her hands ready to fire.

  She could hear them plainly now. They were returning to the village. She got up and ran for the side of the tipi. At that moment, Duke stuck his head above the ridge and bit his tongue to keep a hoarse yell from springing to his throat.

  He grabbed his Sharps and laid the barrel over the edge, openly, brazenly. He didn’t care if they saw it or not. If any one of them made a move toward Sarah it would be his last move.

  His mouth was dry and he could not swallow as he saw Sarah stand up full and sprint the last hundred feet and dive for the side of the tent. He saw her slip beneath it.

  Sarah stood up, listening, against a thick bundle of furs. They were moving all around the tipis now. She closed her eyes and opened them in the hope of hastening her eyes into adjusting to the darkness inside the tent The heat was unbearable. She had seen no opening in the tipi from the ridge and now she knew why no one
ever went in or came out; there was no opening. The sweat began to roll off her face and down into the neck of her shirt. Slowly her eyes grew accustomed to the faint light. All around her were piles and bails of furs the Indians had trapped over the winter.

  The noise outside was moving away from the storage tent now, moving, Sarah guessed, to their individual tents. She stepped to the opposite side of the tent and made a small hole in the facing near one of the poles. She peeked out. The street was still full of activity, but most of the braves and the squaws had gone to their tipis. Down at the other end of the village she could see the young boys taking the horses and the remainder of the meat down toward the pens where the broom-tails and stolen draft horses were kept.

  She stepped back from the side of the tent and examined the inside more carefully. There wasn’t any reason that she could think of for the Indians to come into the tipi. She was safe as long as she remained quiet.

  She examined the skin of the tent carefully, and at four sides made small holes near the lacings so she could see both the sand ridge, where Duke lay hidden, and the entire street of the Indian village.

  She stripped off her hat and wiped her face with her neckerchief. The heat was bad but the smell of the furs was overwhelming. She clenched her teeth and moved from peephole to peephole, examining the face of every brave she saw.

  She had no plan. She did not know how she would locate One Nest—find out where he was—or if he was still alive. But she was in his village, and she contented herself with that thought.

  It was full dark before Duke moved. He slipped his Sharps over the edge of the sand ridge and moved slowly, hugging the ground and stopping every ten feet or so, listening and watching the village for movement other than those of the squaws in front of their tipis and the play of the children.

  It took him nearly an hour to gain the back of the tipi. He slipped his head beneath the edge and waited. “Sarah!” he whispered.

  He pulled himself in and remained still. “Sarah? Answer me. Its Duke!”

  Silence.

  He stood up and moved around the bundles and bails of furs. He kept his Sharps up, ready, and slipped from one bail of furs to another. He stepped on something-backed up and clamped his mouth shut on a yell.

  He stooped down. His hands traced out the prone figure of Sarah. He began to curse silently to himself, his fingers jerking at the screw cap of the canteen, sloshing water on her face. She began to gag and started to cough. Duke held his hands over her face and leaned ' down close to her. “Be quiet!”

  She relaxed, and then Duke felt her raise her arm and in the deep dark saw the low flash of metal. She had lain in wait for him with a knife.

  She sat up. “You shouldn’t have come down here,” she said.

  “You talk that way!” He swore at her, his voice mean. “You must be crazy.”

  “I am.” She stood up.

  “Have you learned anything?”

  “No. I have peepholes cut into the lacings around the poles and I've been watching all day but haven’t seen any sign of him.”

  “Sit quiet now,” Duke cautioned. “I’m going to look.”

  He slipped away from her, moved along the edge of the tent skin, and found the hole that he judged would look directly into the village street. He pressed his eye against it. The same scene that he had watched from the sand ridge. He stepped to the other holes and saw the same thing. Squaws fixing their meals before their tipis, children playing and being yelled at by the squaws and now and then a brave leaving one tipi to enter another.

  He turned back to Sarah. “Were going to have to search the village,” he said. “That’s the only way we’ll find out anything.”

  “You’re talking foolish.” Sarah said. “We’ve got a perfect hiding place here. You understand Comanche and can listen tomorrow. We don’t even know if he’s still here or not.”

  “As soon as the village is quiet, I’ll slip out and take a look around.” Duke said.

  “If you go, I go,” Sarah said and Duke heard that special urgency in her voice that meant she going. He saw down beside her. “There isn’t any use talking about it, Mr. Duke, my being here now should—”

  “Quiet!”

  Someone was walking toward the tipi—several of them, Duke judged. “Get back and keep down. Don’t breathe!” he cautioned.

  The soft footfalls stopped at the edge of the tent. Then voices began to filter through the skins. “They’re coming inside!” Duke hissed.

  “Why?” Sarah asked.

  “Shh!” Duke listened to the deep muttering, not daring to breathe. “I can’t get it. But they’re talking about the furs.”

  There was a rustling, and Sarah and Duke knew the lacings of one pole were being unthreaded. They retreated to the furtherest side of the tipi and dropped behind a pile of furs. Duke turned quickly and pulled a bale down on top of the others to throw up a barrier between them. He pulled out his knife, and indicated that Sarah should do the same. She slipped the blade out and held it tightly.

  The edge of the tipi was thrown back and the cool night air filled the tent like a blast of arctic wind. Sarah nearly sneezed.

  Duke listened to the voices. And then the tipi was filled with light. Duke moved a pelt slightly and stole a look at them. Three braves were examining the furs, as if looking for something. All of them were young. One picked up a pelt and ran his fingers through the fur. “They sit here and stink and the fur becomes hard—and yet he will not let us trade with the white.”

  “They will be worthless if we do not trade soon,” the second replied.

  “Why does he hesitate?” the third asked.

  “Who knows? He waits for medicine. One cannot argue with a chief who waits for medicine.” They moved back toward the opening of the tent.

  “We do not need medicine to trade furs with the white.”

  “After—” the brave said a word Duke could not understand—“he does not dare make another move without the right medicine.”

  “Kaygeesee waited even longer for medicine,” one of them said.

  “Even Kaygeesee’s medicine would not have protected him at—” and again there was the word Duke could not understand.

  They were outside now, lacing up the tent again.

  “He's here,” Duke whispered to Sarah. The word he had not understood, after much thought, he realized must be Little Ben.

  They waited until an hour before dawn and then slit the tipi skin at the back, facing the ridge. They moved out quickly, the heavy morning mists drifting around them in swirls, covering their bodies in vague blankets.

  They were past the three remaining storage tents and approaching one of the nearest of the tipi used by the Indians. The cookfire before the flap was out. Duke looked around for signs of a dog and, seeing none, nodded to Sarah. She took up a position on the opposite side of the flap and nodded. They both held their knives tightly.

  Duke drew back the flap and moved inside, Sarah following half a second later. A man, two women and several children lay sleeping. Duke moved to the brave, dropped to his knee and pressed the point into the man’s neck. The Indian opened his eyes wide, fear springing to them. He swallowed and then glanced at Sarah.

  Bending low, Duke spoke to him in a whisper. “Get up and follow me—make one sound and your children die.”

  The Indian nodded and as he moved to get up, Duke drew his Colt. The brave stood up and stepped quietly over the body of one of the women and out into the mists. They moved back to the storage tent quickly and pushed him inside.

  He turned and faced Sarah and Duke calmly. “You will die for this, white!”

  Duke pulled the knife again and with a catlike motion, barely slit the skin of the brave on his right cheek. “You will be the one to die if you do not do as we say.”

  The Indian felt the blood and looked at it on his fingers. “What do you want?” he asked, holding his voice under control.

  “Where is your chief, One Nest?”

 
; The Indian refused to reply, folding his arms and staring at Sarah and Duke with pressed lips and calm face.

  Duke lashed out with the knife again; blood flowed down the opposite cheek. The brave did not flinch. “Which of your wives do you value the most?”

  The brave did not move.

  “Go get the young one,” Duke said to Sarah. The Indian did not move. “No—wait—get the old one!” Duke said again and the brave’s face began to twitch. “It is probably his mother.” Sarah had not moved.

  "Why do you seek my chief?” the Indian asked.

  Duke told him of Sarah’s children, the boy and the girl. The Indian did not move. Finally, when Duke had finished, the Indian spit on the ground.

  “Watch him,” Duke said, and backed off. “If he just so much as moves an eyeball—shoot him and don’t worry about the noise.”

  Sarah leveled the carbine and took Duke’s place. The cowboy slipped out of the tipi and though it was getting light, moved to the brave’s tent. He lowered his voice and spoke in gruff, garbled Comanche. “Come out here, old woman!”

  He waited. There was movement inside, finally the flap was pushed back and the old woman stuck out her head. She opened her mouth to scream, but Duke slammed her over the head with his Colt and caught her before she fell. He slung her over his back and hurried back to Sarah and the brave.

  He dropped the old woman on the ground and slapped her face until she began to moan and hold her head. Duke had hit her a little too hard and it took a few minutes and some of his canteen water before she regained her senses. She looked around, saw the bleeding brave and began to scream again. Duke grabbed her and slapped his hand over her mouth. “This is your son, isn’t it?”

  She nodded.

  Duke pulled out the Colt, cocked it and aimed it at her head. He turned to the brave. “Your mother will die if you do not tell me where your chief One Nest hides like a cur!”