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Once his coughing stopped, Justin stood there in the middle of the dirt yard and stared at the pueblo fort. The windows were narrow enough to let a scrap of breeze through and to poke rifle barrels out of when they were threatened, which had happened often enough they practiced a defensive drill. They were all inside the house, the whole family. That would be Aunt Sara, who had gone back to her maiden name of Bolger when she had taken over the homestead, Scamp and little Missy Bodean and, of course, Button Riley, fifteen, Justin’s age, who Sara had adopted when her parents died.
This was the first time since Aunt Sara had taken him in that he felt the family had excluded him. He didn’t much care for it. The sun felt harsher than usual, but he’d stand out here alone even if it burned off his stupid eyebrows. The wind scraped at him and rubbed dust into his hair. They’d acted as if he had done something horribly wrong, but no harm had come of it.
He glanced around at every bit of high ground within sight of the small spread. He couldn’t see a thing. Justin listened but could hear nothing from the house either. They’d had their bit of lunch, so he felt at loose ends. Usually he had chores to do. With that in mind, he went over to the garden plot and picked up the hoe Button had been using and began to clear out weeds.
You come out west thinking it’s going to be high adventure and you end up a dirt farmer. He sighed, but kept hoeing.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Button, came toward him at a near stomp, anger still showing as a pink flush on her face and in the edge to her voice. She’d tucked her long red hair under a worn felt cowboy hat that had long ago lost its desired shape in a rain storm.
“Just trying to help out.”
“You’ve done plenty enough for one day.” Button grabbed the hoe from his hand. The freckles on her cheeks that he thought helped make her look so cute seemed subdued by the sparks coming from her eyes. In all the time he’d been here staying with the family this was the first time she had spoken in a harsh tone to him.
Justin lowered his head and moved away. Out of the corner of his eye he saw her take savage slashes at the weeds with the hoe as if he had put the darn things there.
He eased his way over to the goat pen, where Boxo saw him and came briskly trotting over to nuzzle her head under his extended hand. Small comfort a jenny liking him when he was getting a cold shoulder from the family he thought had cared. The goats in the pen crowded closer, hoping for food. Justin heard steps coming toward him. He looked up, saw Scamp coming his way carrying the muzzleloader. He wore the same sort of coveralls Button wore, the kind farmers wear. But, what the heck. Farmers is what they were, not cowfolk, even though cattle still roamed all around outside their little fenced-off spread. Justin had to look twice to confirm Scamp was grinning.
“Come on. Why don’t we take a look yonder and see what we can make of what was going on up there.” Scamp nodded toward the slight hill where Justin had spotted the Comanche. He ran the fingers of one hand through his dirty blond hair that could use a cleaning and wouldn’t be sorry to see a comb.
Justin dropped his hand from Boxo’s furry head and spun away. The little jenny voiced a small bray of complaint as Justin hurried off beside Scamp. Though Scamp was a year-and-a-half younger, Justin didn’t mind following someone who knew more about what he was doing than Justin did. Tenderfoot. Greenhorn. He’d heard all the words. They no longer embarrassed him because his life depended on learning all he could as quickly as he could. The rules of existing were different out west and the mistakes often fatal.
The hike up to the crest of the hill took only a couple of minutes, which confirmed how close the young Indian had come to the house. At the top, Scamp bent low and looked closely at the ground. “Ah, yeah. You saw a Comanche.”
“How can you tell?” Justin bent close and peered at the moccasin print in the loose dirt.
“Because on their moccasins they use par-fleche for the soles. They wet, then dry and harden the leather for longer wear.”
“Oh.”
“And only the one of them. He went down this way.” Scamp followed a trail he could see in the windblown dust and bent grass. Justin couldn’t make out anything no matter how hard he tried.
“Here’s where he tied his horse.” Scamp pointed to the bent end of a limb.
Justin could see that, and the hoof prints that took off from the spot. It looked like only one horse to him, though he was far from being an expert. Scamp walked along the horse’s trail for a quarter of a mile.
“What are you looking for?” Justin finally said.
“Just making sure he was alone. That’s a good thing.” He paused. “For now.”
“I said I saw only one. Why was Aunt Sara so all-fired riled up?”
Scamp glanced back toward the house before he answered. He scanned the hills around with a sweep of his eyes as he turned back to give Justin a smile, though his eyes were stern. “We’ve got ways of doing things so we’re sure of taking care of each other. If you’d have rushed in after one Injun and got jumped by six others you’d be dead, and more important, we’d have no way of getting a warning about a passel of Comanche practically outside our door.”
“Okay. I goofed. But it turned out all right. She still looked madder than half a dozen wet hens.”
“It’s not all right. She’s still in there grumping around.”
“What has Aunt Sara so all-fired cranky? She wasn’t that way when I came out here. It’s not me, is it?”
“It’s a lot of things.”
“But not me?”
“Well, you didn’t help by that tomfool rushing right into what coulda been an Injun trap. But that’s only part of what has her all aflutter. “
“What’s worse than me being stupid, and her thinking so, and, worse, Button thinking so.”
“I wouldn’t worry about Button. She’s just disappointed in you. After a spell she’ll remember you’ve barely come out here from back East and about everybody who does that makes Boxo over there look bright for a while.”
“Don’t worry about Button? That’s easy for you to say.”
“Okay. She used to kinda like you. Big deal. Now she thinks you’re goat plop. She’ll get over it . . . maybe. Anyway, what’s bugging Mom, who is usually tough as they come, is the two empty ranches that surround our little spread.”
“So what? The cattle roam free, but her fences keep them out. And the Indians have left the goats alone for a spell since the calves are easy pickings.”
“But how long will it stay that way. You remember what rough types the Bentleys and Mister Kenedy’s bunch were, how they fought it out.”
“Sure seemed stupid to kill each other off that way.”
“It’s the honor code of the south. You can’t back down. But that’s not the thing. Someone’s gonna want that land, and they may decide to try for our spread again, little as it is, just like Captain Bentley did. And don’t forget, his son Gabe is running around loose somewheres since he broke loose from jail.”
“With a price on his head for robbing stagecoaches. He may have been one of them who killed my Dad on the way here.”
“Well, as much as all of that’s a bother, Mom’s got one more thing up her craw.”
“What’s that?”
“That friend of yours, Francis, he wrote her that he was headed back this way for a visit.”
“You don’t think he’s setting his hat for your Ma do you?”
“I sure hope not.”
“You think she’s likely to give in?”
“No. I think, even big as he is, if he plays that hand too hard that she’s apt just to kill him.”
Sleeping Bear rode his pinto mare out into the open as he neared the Comanche makeshift camp. High on a rocky ridge to his right a warrior rose from behind a rock to let Sleeping Bear see him, one of the two Kiowa warriors who rode with Bent Feather’s Comanche band. As quickly as he’d risen the warrior disappeared out of sight.
By the time Sleeping Bear had ridden around the base of the hill, the others were looking up from the campfire, expecting him. The breeze wafting toward him carried an aroma that reminded him he had not eaten since he’d slipped away from the camp before the sun rose. The hunger was good. He told himself he was learning to ignore the stabbing stomach pain just as he withstood the cold in the early morning dives into the icy teeth of winter streams.
Bent Feather and his renegade band had camped on the rock-strewn shoal beside a stream, intending only a quick camp, a chance to grab a bit of sleep and then eat while on the run. A herd of stolen horses mingled with their own remuda of steeds. Sticks arched over the campfire. Grease and fat dripped off the slabs and rib racks of beef. These were hearty eating times. With the ranchers gone the cattle roamed free and they could kill a calf far easier than it had been to bring down a running buffalo back before the palefaces had wiped out the herds that once covered the plains. Bent Feather seemed reluctant to believe their good fortune could last long. He had lived through a lot before he’d led the few of them off the reservation in a war party. His experiences had made him cautious and bitter. His heart burned with a fury Sleeping Bear had seen displayed . . . often, a reason he followed and admired and feared Bent Feather.
He tied his mare with the other horses and sat by the fire. He waited for Bent Feather to speak.
“What did you learn in your scouting all alone?”
Sleeping Bear kept his eyes fixed on Bent Feather. “I know I should have asked. But everyone was asleep.”
They spoke in Comanche, the language of The People, and both sometimes underscored what they said with hand signs.
“Not everyone. Coyote Eyes saw you leave. He thought you might wish to slip back to the reservation.”
“Why would I do that? We find much food here. I stayed when we fought. I helped steal the horses in the heat of firing guns. Why would I leave just when we get fat?”
Bent Feather nodded.
They sat in quiet while one of the other warriors turned the spits and sent more beef drippings sizzling into the fire. Sleeping Bear felt his stomach give a hungry lurch.
After a long spell, Bent Feather spoke. “Was there a woman?”
Sleeping Bear hesitated. “Yes. There was.”
Bent Feather nodded again and came as close to smiling as he ever did, a small uplifted tightening at one corner of his thin lips.
Sleeping Bear didn’t say anything about the red hair on the paleface girl he hoped to bring to camp as a slave. That would come later when he’d accomplished his brave deed.
One of the warriors started to carve pieces of beef. Sleeping Bear was eager to reach out a hand until he saw Bent Feather’s stern look as he nodded up toward the hill where the lookout brave had been posted. “Go let Yellow Hand come down to eat.”
Sleeping Bear started to reach for a scrap of meat. Bent Feather shook his head. Sleeping Bear understood he was being punished for leaving camp early without permission. His stomach seemed to tighten into an empty knot, but he started up the hill to take a turn as lookout sentry.