In the clear air out here on the high plains, he saw Fort Laramie long before he reached it. Reining in the tall Appaloosa stallion, he stared for a moment at the parapets and the buildings showing above them, there on the plains near where the Laramie River met the Platte. He was a big man, wide-shouldered, narrow-hipped, torso clad in a fringed buckskin Cheyenne war shirt, long legs in denim pants and high Cheyenne moccasins, a slouch hat on his head, an eagle feather set in its crown. In his middle thirties, he had the face of a hawk, beaked nose, high cheekbones; and his skin was the color of a new penny. Indian at first glance, Cheyenne undoubtedly: but then there was the golden color of the long hair spilling down to his shoulders, and the hard gray of his eyes; and no full blood had ever had such hair or eyes. He was, in fact, a half-breed, his father English, his mother Cheyenne. His name was Sundance, and the Colt on his hip, the Bowie on the other one, the cased hatchet with the straight handle made for throwing looped around his saddle-horn, and the Winchester in the saddle scabbard were the tools of his trade, which was fighting.
Usually he did not hire out his weapons cheaply; as the best in the business, he could afford to charge the most, but it was not money which had brought him all the way from Indian Territory to Wyoming. The letter from George Crook, who was the only serving general in the army who knew or gave a damn about Indians, had been enough for him. Crook—Three-Stars, the Indians called him—needed him, and that was all that mattered.
Now, the end of his long ride near, he touched the spotted stallion with his heels, and the big horse fell into a lope. It covered the remaining distance handily, and they had nearly reached the fort when gunfire, the deep cough of half a dozen rounds from a Colt revolver, shattered the silence of the afternoon.
Reining in the stud, whose name was Eagle, Sundance cocked his head. More shooting, from the lowlands outside the fort and to his right. His hand drifted to his pistol butt.
Then he heard the laughing and the whooping, and he relaxed. With no women and scant whiskey, soldiers out here passed their time as best they could, and shooting contests were a favorite sport. Still, his curiosity was aroused, and he turned the horse and rode toward the sound of guns.
Behind a rise, dismounting, he ground-reined Eagle. Cat-footed and crouched, he went up the hill and looked over the crest. Below, in the shallow valley of a dry creek, thirty or forty men, some in uniform and some civilians, had gathered, mostly on this bank, three or four on the far one. As Sundance watched, a man on the far bank hammered a small target, a playing card, perhaps, to the trunk of a cottonwood. Then, as the crowd on the near bank shifted, Sundance recognized a tall, lanky form, a man with a thin face and a spade beard; and he grinned. Three-Stars, General Crook, the man he’d come this far to see.
The grin faded, though, a frown replacing it at the sight of the two men flanking the lanky general. On his left was a big man in buckskins worked almost snow-white and dripping with fringe, emblazoned with bead-and-quill-work, and Sundance thought he had seen him somewhere before, but could not place him. The man on Crook’s right was even bigger, a giant, standing a good six and a half feet tall, with shoulders like a barn door and a chest like a barrel: and he wore a uniform of a kind Sundance had never before seen. A high fur hat made him look even taller, and his enormous torso was encased in a red tunic splashed with gold braid. Skintight white pants with a blue stripe down the sides ended in high, gleaming boots. A riding crop dangled from the wrist of one huge hand, and, absent-mindedly, he kept tapping it against his boot.
Now Crook spoke to the man in the gaudy buckskins. That one stepped forward, and his big frame slipped into a crouch that Sundance knew of old, the gunman’s stance, hand dangling by the low-slung holster on his hip. Then he drew, and Sundance whistled softly at the speed with which he did it. Six reports from the single-action Colt made one drawn-out roll of thunder, and the playing card across the creek, thirty yards away, was torn to bits.
The giant in red raised both hands, clapping excitedly. Crook nodded. So did Sundance. It was shooting, all right, damned good shooting. The man in buckskins was a real wizard, an artist with a Colt.
Curiosity rising higher in him, Sundance went back to Eagle, mounted, and put the stallion over the ridge. The crowd down there at the creek, hearing hoof beats, turned. Crook squinted: then, recognizing the tall form on the Nez Percé stud, raised his hand, waved, and as Sundance neared, strode toward him, like some gaunt, ungainly water bird.
At first glance, George Crook could have been mistaken for some down-on-his-luck and wandering mountain man. As usual, he wore a shabby linen duster over an assortment of odds and ends of uniform clothing, and his broad-brimmed hat was battered and weathered. The fact was that no man in the Army knew the West and its Indians better than he, and few out of it. He had served in every corner of it, had fought Apaches, Sioux, Cheyennes, and the northwestern tribes of Oregon and Washington. Remorseless in war, generous in victory, he would, Sundance had often thought, have made a fine Indian war chief himself.
“Jim!” Crook’s face lit as Sundance swung down off the Appaloosa.
“Three-Stars.” Sundance jerked his head toward the crowd on the wash’s bank. “What’s going on?”
Crook’s grin faded as they shook hands. “You got here just in time. Six-gun Sam Dillon’s showing off for the Grand Duke of Russia.”
“What?” Sundance stared.
“That’s right. The man in the red coat. He’s a Russian nobleman, and he’s here on a hunting trip as guest of the United States government. He’s also one hell of a problem, and that’s why I sent for you. I appreciate your coming, Jim. I need you need you badly.”
“What for?” Sundance looked at the giant in the red coat, the man in buckskins, who was cramming fresh shells into his gun.
“No time to explain just now.” Crook’s voice was low. “But now you’re here, I want you in this shooting match. And it’s vital that you win. Do you know Sam Dillon?”
Something clicked in Sundance’s mind. “Yeah. Yeah, I know him. Had a run-in with him at Fort Harker a couple of years ago. A tinhorn gambler and back shooter from Kansas.”
“That’s what he used to be,” Crook said grimly. “Right now he’s a lot more than that. I’ll explain later. But just now I’m going to set up a contest between the two of you, and you’ve got to be at least as good as he is, better if possible. It’s important you not let him outshoot you. And don’t underestimate him. He may be a tinhorn, but he’s a genius with a handgun.”
“Three-Stars—”
“Come on,” Crook said, and took Sundance’s arm and pulled him toward the creek. As they neared its bank, the man in white buckskins came forward. He wore his auburn hair long, falling to his shoulders, and he had great cowhorn mustaches the same color. His face was curiously soft, though, and only lightly tanned, and his brown eyes met Sundance’s, flared with recollection and remembered anger, then shifted. Dillon had changed his clothes, Sundance thought, and had let his hair and mustache grow, but this was the same man, all right. And true enough, he’d had the reputation down in Kansas of being a crack shot. Had notches on his gun, too, but Sundance had never heard of any of them being earned in a fair, straight-up gunfight.
There was a lot of difference between being able to use a gun and having the guts to be a gunfighter, and Dillon liked the edge of the sudden shot from behind or beneath a table. Anyhow, the one time he and Sundance had tangled, Dillon had never had a chance to use a gun.
Truth to tell, Sundance had only a hazy memory of the incident at Fort Harker. His half-measure of Indian blood made it hard for him to handle whiskey. Two drinks were his usual limit; any more than that and he was likely to get mean. That day at Harker, he had come in tired and bitter from a long trip across the buffalo range, where hide hunters were slaughtering bison by the thousands and leaving everything to rot except the skins and tongues. Full of pent-up fury, Sundance had overshot his limit, had half a bottle in him by the time, heading for where he had left the stallion, he saw Dillon and a Tonkawa woman at the edge of the fort’s parade ground. They were arguing over a bundle of laundry she had evidently washed for him, and her words were audible in the silence of the hot afternoon. “Three times now you no pay. I need money, food for my children. I wait, wait, still you no pay—”
“You’ll git your money when I’m damned good and ready, you stinkin’ squaw!” Dillon had snapped. In gambler’s black and brocaded vest, then, he had turned on his heel, the package of clothes beneath his arm. The woman halted indecisively, then followed, plucking at his sleeve. “Meester Dillon, you promise—”
“Goddamit, take your filthy hands off me!” Dillon spun, and Sundance heard the sharp pop his open hand made, slamming against her face. The woman landed on her back in the dust—and Sundance moved.
Dillon never even knew what hit him. Sundance was behind him in two long, silent strides. One hand seized the collar of Dillon’s claw hammer coat, the other his belt. Big as Dillon was, Sundance, in drunken rage, lifted him with ease, raising him high, then slamming him down with stunning force against the hard-packed, hoof-trampled parade ground.
Gold eagles dropped from Dillon’s pocket, rolled through the dust. As Dillon lay dazed, Sundance scooped up a pair and tossed them to the woman. “Here. That enough?”
She looked at him in awe. “Plenty.”
“Then go,” Sundance said.
“But—” Then her eyes widened. “Look out!” she yelled.
Sundance whirled. Dillon, on his knees, was clawing for his six-gun. Sundance’s own hand moved and suddenly Dillon was looking up the bore of a .45. “All right,” Sundance said. “I’ll take that iron. Butt first, slow and easy.” Dillon’s eyes flared with mingled rage and fear as he passed it over. Sundance watched carefully, guarding against a possible road-agent’s spin, but Dillon lacked the guts for that maneuver. Sundance took the gun. “You’re lucky I don’t bend this around your head. Next time you owe a debt, you pay it, understand? Even if it’s to an Indian. Especially if it’s to an Indian.”
“Who the hell are you?” Dillon whispered. “My name’s Sundance. I’ll leave your gun at post headquarters. You want to come looking for me, I’ll be around.”
And he had waited, at the sutler’s store, but Dillon had not come looking. In fact, he’d disappeared from Harker, vanished into the hellholes of the town of Ellsworth, four miles away. Sundance had neither seen nor heard of him since.
“Mr. Dillon, Mr. Sundance,” Crook said innocently. “I believe you two already know each other.”
“Dillon,” Sundance said. He did not put out his hand.
“You. It was you at Fort Harker—”
“That’s right,” Sundance said. He stood loosely, hand by his Colt. He was puzzled, by Dillon’s clothes: these buckskins were like a stage costume, a mixture of Sioux, Navajo, and, as near as he could tell, some Chippewa thrown in. But there was nothing puzzling about the mixture of fear and hatred in Dillon’s eyes.
The man in the red uniform broke the silence stretching between them. “General Crook, if you please—” Coming up, he towered over all of them, face square and rugged and deeply tanned, black eyes snapping with lusty vitality, black curly beard falling halfway down his massive chest. He slapped the riding crop against his boots impatiently.
“Ah, yes, your grace,” Crook said. “Mr. Jim Sundance, may I introduce his Excellency, Grand Duke Andre Romanov, Master of Horse to the Imperial Household, General in the Russian cavalry, whom it is my privilege to entertain. Your grace, Mr. Sundance is an old friend, and a famous frontiersman and plainsman himself.”
Andre put out a hand not much smaller than a ham. “Mr. Sundance. Delighted.” His voice was deep and booming, his English only slightly accented. His grip was like a bear-trap’s clamp.
Sundance returned it with a squeeze of equal strength. “Honored, your grace.” When the Duke let go, Sundance had to flex his fingers.
“Now,” said the Russian. “Please, may we go ahead with the shooting?”
“Of course.” Crook’s voice was smooth. “Mr. Dillon here was giving us an exhibition of marksmanship, Jim, and I must say he is superb. I was just telling the Duke, I know of only one man who is his equal with a Colt—and then, by Jove, suddenly you were here.”
“Yes, he has spoken of you, Mr. Sundance. But I find it hard to believe that there can be another marksman as good as Six-gun Sam.”
“Six-gun Sam?” Sundance looked at Dillon, and the man’s face reddened.
“They call me that, Sundance,” he said.
“Do they, now?” Sundance said dryly.
Crook said quickly, “Maybe Mr. Sundance and Mr. Dillon would like to engage in a little friendly competition.” There was something urgent in the way he touched Sundance’s arm.
All right, Sundance thought. If Crook wanted it that badly. He made a show of hesitation. “Well, generally, when I shoot, it’s for business, not for show. But ...”
The Duke had risen to the bait, interest in his eyes. “I should think that would be very interesting. Six-gun Sam—?”
Dillon’s mouth thinned, his eyes shifted. Then, a touch reluctantly, as the Duke made a sound in his throat, he nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I can take you, Sundance.”
“Likely. You pick the targets.”
Dillon nodded, and his confidence seemed to be coming back. “Yeah. I’ll do that. You want to put some money on it?”
“Wait,” Crook said, “I didn’t mean to get betting started—”
Sundance motioned him to silence. “How much?”
“Say five hundred dollars.”
“Too much. Couldn’t cover it.”
“Then forget it,” Dillon said, turning away contemptuously. Anger flared in Sundance at the cheapness of the gambit: naming stakes he’d known Sundance probably couldn’t afford, shrugging off the refusal to make it seem as if Sundance lacked nerve. You don’t wiggle out of it that easy, Sundance thought quickly. “Three-Stars! My credit good with you for four hundred bucks?”
“Absolutely,” Crook said without hesitation.
“Then you’re on,” Sundance said. “Pick your targets, Dillon. General, find somebody to hold the money.”
“I’ll do that,” a tall, beak-nosed cavalry captain said, stepping forward. “Anybody else want to bet?”
“Of course!” the Grand Duke boomed. “I will bet another five hundred dollars on my friend Six-gun Sam! Who will take it?”
Crook drew in a deep breath. “I’ll cover that, your grace.”
Sundance felt a sudden chill. Not even a General could afford a nine hundred dollar loss if Dillon outshot him, not at Army wages. But when Crook added firmly, “I have every confidence in Jim Sundance,” he knew there was no out.
Lifting his tunic, the Duke fumbled in a money belt, and brought out a wad of American currency.’ Sundance produced his hundred dollars, Dillon took five hundred from a money belt of his own, and Crook wrote an IOU. Captain Warren, rangy, competent-looking, said, “Now, what will you gentlemen use for targets?”
Dillon dug in his pockets, brought out two quarters. “These. Captain, suppose you throw ’em for us, same height, same distance. Man hits his quarter most times takes the cash. Right?”
Warren looked impressed. “That will be some shooting, Mr. Dillon.”
“Let’s make it a little tougher,” Sundance said. He reached in his own pocket. “They ain’t common out here, but I just happen to have a couple of dimes.”
“Sundance, for God’s sake!” Crook blurted. Dillon stared at the bright new ten-cent pieces. “Now, wait—”
“It’s up to you. If the dime’s too little, we’ll use the quarters.”
Before Dillon could speak, the Grand Duke said, “Of course! Six-gun Sam can hit anything anybody can, right, my friend?”
Dillon looked trapped, but he nodded reluctantly. “Right.”
Slowly, dubiously, Warren took the coins. The gathered men murmured excitedly. The Grand Duke laughed. “Wait until I tell the court at St. Petersburg! They will never believe me!”
“All right,” Warren said. “Who shoots first?”
That was settled by a flip of a quarter, and Dillon won first shot. Sundance watched as he took stance on the creek bank, body loose, relaxed, legs apart, knees only slightly bent, hands dangling. Whatever else Dillon might be, he had the grace and movement of a born marksman.
Now the crowd was absolutely silent. Warren cleared his throat. “Ready?”
“Ready,” Dillon whispered.
The captain’s hand jerked.
The dime was only a tiny wink of light, glittering in the sun as it arced high above the creek bed. Dillon drew and fired. At the first shot, the coin jumped like something living; the second sent it spinning across the wash, and the third was a genuine marvel. When, at long range, it smashed the dime and hurtled it far across the creek to land in the brush, men yelled, and even Sundance said, “That’s shooting!”
Dillon seemed to swell. Confident, cocky as a rooster, he turned, grinning. “All right, half-breed, let’s see you beat that.”
“It’s gonna be hard to do,” Sundance said, and meant it.
“You never will,” Dillon scoffed.
And maybe he was right, Sundance thought, stepping to the creek bank. Maybe he had over-reached himself. Dillon had already had practice shots, was well warmed up, and he himself was cold, body stiff after his long ride, and the Duke’s crushing handshake hadn’t done his fingers any good. But worry would only compound the other disadvantages, so he relaxed, was perfectly cool as he took up stance near Warren.
The afternoon was silent as Warren fingered the last dime.
“Ready?”
“Throw!” Sundance snapped.
The dime arced up, a duplicate of the throw made for Dillon.
What happened next took the crowd by surprise. As the dime went straight up, Sundance drew, at the same time falling on his back. He fired straight up, and the bullet caught the dime at the height of its rise and sent it spinning even higher. Sundance fired again and drove it even higher, as it started to fall. This time it was hit on a skew, sailed out over the creek bed, and the half-breed’s third shot caught it at an angle, both from the side and underneath and it jumped crazily. His fourth shot sent the tattered bit of metal spinning laterally, to twinkle out across the wash and vanish.
Then, like a big cat, Sundance was on his feet, sliding fresh rounds from cartridge belt into guns. The crowd along the wash was absolutely silent, awed.
“Four hits to three,” Sundance said and allowed himself a crooked grin. “I think I take the money.”
Dillon stood there, face chalk-pale beneath its tan, mouth working like that of a stranded fish. Then words burst from him. “Not fair, godammit! You—”
“Nobody said what position we had to fire from. You drove your dime away from you. Me, I kept mine where I had time for an extra shot. Captain Warren, if you will pay the winnings—”
“Right,” Warren said briskly in a tone that left no doubt that he was glad to see Sundance the winner. “General Crook ... Mr. Sundance ... ”
“But, dammit—” Dillon burst out. “I—” The Duke laid a big hand on his shoulder. “Enough, Six-gun Sam. He did not outshoot you, but he outthought you. He earns the money. Mr. Sundance, I congratulate you.” But his voice was harsh. “Perhaps you will have a drink with me.”
“Later, your grace,” Crook said, before Sundance could speak. “First I have business with Mr. Sundance in my office. Perhaps you and Mr. Dillon will join us there in half an hour.”
“Of course,” said the Duke coldly.
“Come on, Jim.” Crook took Sundance’s arm. They walked up the hill together toward Sundance’s stallion. “Thank God,” the General whispered, “that you beat him. That will help a little, anyhow.”
“Help at what?” Sundance almost snapped the words, the tension of reaction building in him.
“At stopping an Indian war,” Crook said tersely. “A bad Sioux outbreak. And maybe even preventing war between the United States and Russia.”
“What?” Sundance stopped and stared at him.
Crook pushed him on. “Not here,” he whispered. “I’ll tell you all about it in my office.” Then an orderly brought him his saddle mule. He swung up, gestured toward the Appaloosa. “Come on, let’s ride.”