Novel 1972 - Callaghen (v5.0) (11 page)

The driver was Johnny Ridge, whom Callaghen had seen around the camp on several occasions. The man beside him was a stranger.

“Injuns,” was the answer. “We spotted them moving to head us off, so when the stage was out of sight behind a mountain we pulled off the trail and tried to circle around, but we got ourselves bogged down and found our way cut off.”

“The patrol’s somewhere ahead of us,” Callaghen said, “but I think your best bet, Ridge, is to follow along the base of the mountain, keeping clear of the sand of the Devil’s Playground, until we can find a pass through to the east.”

“And how far will that be?” Ridge asked doubtfully.

Callaghen shrugged. “This is no great mountain. There’s sure to be a way to the other side.”

“But it’s further from the Vegas trail, and my horses are about played out.”

“You’ve got Indians behind you, man. Drive on. You can rest your horses farther along. I’ll scout ahead for you.”

Callaghen went to the coach. Malinda was there, and her aunt, but Kurt Wylie was, too, and the dark man who had come with him to Camp Cady. “You’ll be all right,” he told Malinda, and rode on ahead.

The mountain lifted two to three thousand feet above them in what seemed to be a solid wall, but these desert ranges were all short, up-thrusts made during some violent time in the earth’s building. The Indians would be watching for them…by day they would find their tracks, no doubt, and then they would come running.

For three miles Callaghen led the way; then he turned into a cove of the mountain and stopped. Dismounting, he waited for the stage to catch up.

The trail, such as it was, had never been used by a wheeled vehicle before, that was obvious, but Ridge was a hand with the lines and he tooled his team nicely, taking his time.

Wylie was the first man down from the stage. He walked up to Callaghen. “You, is it? I’ve been wanting to see you.”

Ridge turned sharply. “Whatever you’ve got in mind, forget it. Just now we need all the help we can get.”

In a hollow among the rocks, where they were concealed except from someone who stood right above them, Callaghen put together a small fire. “Have you coffee?” he asked. “It will put everybody’s spirits up.”

The coffee was produced. The man who had ridden the box brought down a basket and began to prepare food. Malinda came to the fire and stretched her fingers toward it. Aunt Madge moved in briskly, pushing the guard aside. “Leave that to someone who knows how,” she said. “You’ve done a-plenty today.”

Ridge squatted on his heels, holding a piece of hardtack in his mouth to soften it. “You know where we are?” he asked.

Callaghen took up a small stick and drew a line to the northeast. “These are the Old Dads. Somewhere over in there is Marl Springs. There should be three or four men at Marl. There’s water there, and supplies for emergencies.”

“I’ve heard of it,” Ridge said. “I never drove that route.”

“When the patrol doesn’t find you or me, I think they will turn about and ride to Marl. That was on their route, anyway. With luck, they’ll be there when we arrive…or shortly after.”

“All right,” Ridge said, “I’ll go along.” He thrust a couple of roots into the fire. “You see the Injuns?”

“Swapped some shots,” Callaghen said. “I don’t know how many there were, but we counted the tracks of a dozen to fifteen before we started over to help you.”

“That’s a-plenty—more than a-plenty.”

Callaghen was tired. He got up and went over to his horse, stripped the saddle from its back and rubbed it with a handful of galleta grass. He held his canteen in his hand, but decided to wait until morning to drink. He led his horse deep into the cove and drove the picket-pin down solidly. When he got back to the fire, the coffee was ready.

The guard, whose name was Becker, gestured toward the food. “Beats army rations, don’t it, Sarge? I done my time on them desecrated vegetables, hardtack, and salt pork. In an outfit with a good Company Fund where you can buy extry, it ain’t so bad.”

The coffee was good. Callaghen held his cup in both hands, listening to the talk around the camp. He was thinking he had better get some sleep.

Malinda came over to him. “What about your discharge, Mort? Has it come through?”

“It should have,” he said. “I expect I’ll get it fast enough when it comes. Sykes will want to be rid of me.”

“When it does come, what will you do?”

He shrugged. “I’ve saved a little. I’ll have to make a start somewhere. The trouble is, all I know is soldiering.”

Malinda put her hand on his sleeve. “Morty Callaghen, that’s not true, and you know it. You’ve handled men, you understand administration, you know something about law…there’s a lot you could do.”

He looked at her, only half believing. He had never been able to decide what to do, once he left the service. He knew a little of too many things, not enough of anything.

“Sarge?” It was Ridge. “Somebody’s comin’!”

Chapter 11

I
NSTANTLY THERE WAS silence. Overhead the stars hung bright in the black sky, and around them the mountain seemed to crouch, waiting.

Callaghen stepped from the firelight into the darkness, and stood still, listening.

Ridge moved close to him. “I surely heard something out yonder,” he said softly. “Heard it clear.”

Callaghen heard nothing. Ridge was not a tenderfoot. If he believed he had heard something, that was the way to bet.

They moved farther away from the fire, into the darkness. “Stay close, Ridge. I’ll scout around.” He hesitated, then added, “Keep an eye on Wylie and his partner. I don’t trust them.”

“Heard you had a run-in with Wylie.”

“So did Major Sykes. He’s got something going, but I don’t know what it is.”

The night was cool. Away from the fire, he saw at once how good their choice for a camp had been. At a distance of perhaps sixty steps only a faint glow was visible, and as he moved away that diminished, then disappeared.

The camp was in a cul-de-sac, a break that notched the wall of the mountain, and was screened by a slight bend in the notch as well as by rocks and brush. It was a spot such as might be found at fifty places within as many square miles, no more unusual than any of the others.

He paused when well out toward the open desert. That sound could well have come from up on the mountain itself. A sure-footed man could cross any part of it, although there would be difficulties here and there.

He expected Indians, and that was the trouble, for the mind must be always open and alert, excluding no possibility.

A curious deer or mountain sheep will not move as does a prowling mountain lion or coyote, and the movements of men are different, too. A white man wears shoes or boots; the hard leather tends to scuff upon rock, to bear down too heavily on dead grass or leaves, in a way which the Indian’s soft moccasin does not, and a white man’s clothing is likely to make rustling noises in his movements, or against rocks and brush.

Callaghen thought of none of this. He simply listened. He had stopped, as he always did, where his body made no outline against the night, merging with a tall greasewood and a clump of staghorn cactus.

Suddenly, standing alone at the edge of the desert moonlight, silent in the stillness, Callaghen knew it was here he was going to stay. How, he did not know, for around him was desolation, yet a desolation that spoke to him in the softness of the wind, in the bareness of the mountains. But he knew at that moment that he would not leave the desert…or leaving, he would return.

He had known deserts before, but somehow it was to this particular desert he wanted to return. Here he wished to stay. Wind stirred the sand out there on the timeless dunes.

He heard it then, some slight sound in the sand…then silence. He held himself still, hardly breathing for fear that might blot out a sound he was listening for.

Again it came! Somebody or something was out there. Then he heard a low, shuddering moan, and he left the shadow of the brush with a quick stride.

He saw the man lying on the sand before he reached him, and was still half a dozen yards away when he realized who it was…the Delaware! It was The Stick-Walker.

He went to him quickly, stooped and lifted him from the sand, and carried him back to the fire.

“Water,” he said to Aunt Madge. “Water first.”

There was no sign of a wound, but there was evidence that the Delaware had walked for miles—his shoes were in frightful shape.

Wylie stared at them. “Why would a man go into the desert with shoes like that?”

“His shoes weren’t like that,” Callaghen replied shortly. “He was riding with me only a short while ago. That’s what lava does to shoes. He’s crossed the lava beds getting to us.”

Aunt Madge touched the Indian’s lips with water, and let a drop trickle down his throat. He gasped, and struggled up to his elbow, Callaghen helping. The Delaware took another swallow of water.

He looked around, his eyes staring. Comprehension came suddenly when he saw Callaghen.

“We thought you were dead,” he said.

“Where’s the command?”

“Gone…all gone.”

“Killed?”

“I do not know. I don’t think so.” He looked at Aunt Madge and the others. “We were attacked and took shelter; we returned the fire.…After a while one of our men moved. He was killed instantly…three arrows, two in his throat. We thought we heard shooting to the north”—he glanced at Callaghen—“that was you, I think.”

“I did my share.”

The Delaware drank again; then when helped to his feet he walked to the fire where Aunt Madge had prepared some soup.

“I wanted to look for you,” he told Callaghen, “but Sprague refused. He had lost enough men, he said, and he must risk no more. Hours passed. There had been shots, but not many. We were not sure if we were pinned down there or not. I volunteered to scout their position, and after a while he let me go.

“There had been at least a dozen Indians…all gone. I found cartridge cases from their firing, and I found tracks. They were not mounted.

“I took a chance and went north. I knew I would be gone longer than Sprague would think necessary, but I wanted to know about you.”

“Thanks,
amigo
.”

The Delaware swallowed some of the soup. “I found where you had been,” he said, “and I was sure some men had died, but there were no bodies, and there was not you, so I went back to join the command, only it was no longer there. They had vanished…there were no tracks.”

“Over the rocks behind them?”

“Maybe.…I started to skirt the rocks, going the way as I believed they would go, and I came upon the tracks of the stage…and of the Indians. So I went into the lava beds.

“There were places to hide there, but no Indians would travel there unless there was no other way. I followed a wash between lava flows, and crossed a wide flow; several times I saw Indians. There were a dozen at first, then four more, then five more.

“I stayed in the lava. There was no way I could get around them to the stage, so I crossed the trail behind them and got into the mountains. The stage had turned along the western face of the mountains, and I came in from the east.”

“What about the Indians?” Ridge asked.

“They’re out there, you can be sure of that. I do not think they have found where you are, but when morning comes they will.”

“We’re going to Marl Springs,” Callaghen said.

“Then go now. Do not wait until morning.”

Callaghen considered, then said, “We’ll go back and rest,” he said. “We’ve got five good hours of darkness ahead of us, but the stock needs rest and so do we. We’ll start before daylight.”

They let the fire die down. All of them stretched out on blankets and slept. Wylie stood watch first, then Becker.

Becker shook Callaghen awake, when the stars were still large in the sky. “Sarge? Time’s a-wastin’.”

He sat up, pulled on his boots and checked his gun, then rolled his blanket and took it to his horse. In a matter of minutes he was saddled and bridled, ready to go. At the fire he said to Becker, “Wake them up.”

There were still coals, and the blackened coffeepot was still hot. He filled a cup, held it in his chilled fingers, and drank. There was no nonsense and no delaying in either Malinda or Aunt Madge—both had lived too much in army camps.

In fifteen minutes they moved out, cautiously, to make no more sound than necessary. Callaghen led off, walking his horse. The Delaware rode inside.

After a few minutes they dipped through a dry wash, came up on the other side, and found a dim trail leading southwest, the one they had followed the evening before along the face of the mountain.

They traveled an hour…perhaps four miles at the pace they were taking, and then a gap opened in the range. He dropped back beside Ridge. “Wait here.”

He rode ahead swiftly, and when well into the opening he dismounted and struck a light. He found tracks, going and coming, and he had an idea that it was a pass. A little further on he found the tracks of wheeled vehicles.

He rode back to the stage, and it followed him into the pass. On his left the cliff rose steeply for several hundred feet; on the right it was just as high, but not quite so steep.

It was darker in the pass. Callaghen kept well ahead of the sounds of the moving stage so that he could listen, but he heard nothing. The sky overhead was growing gray. Before them loomed a tremendous rock wall, blacking out the sky ahead of them but the trail curved around it, straightening out to a general northeast direction.

He had no idea how far they were from Marl Springs, but it must be at least several hours away. He looked around. The stage was coming on, Ridge tooling his teams over the trail, saving them wherever possible. Callaghen dropped back.

“Want to give them a chance to rest?”

“I’d better.” Ridge drew them in, and then as they stood, stamping and blowing, he asked, “We going to have to run for it, Sarge?”

It was light enough to see now, and within minutes the Indians, if they had not already done so, would find their trail. They had gone about eight miles, and with luck it would take the Indians an hour and a half to come up with them—though less if they cut across the mountains to gamble on heading them off. The Indians were not trail-bound as were the stage and Callaghen himself. Make it two hours to come up with them, for the stage would be moving.