Savage Spirit (2 page)

"Yes, that is so," Cloud Eagle said, nodding.   "The name given to him at birth was, I believe, Alex Burton."

"I do not know any Alex Burton," Charlie said, turning slowly when Cloud Eagle's interest was drawn away from him to his paintings. He followed Cloud Eagle to his easel.

Cloud Eagle leaned over and studied the painting of the sunset, appreciating its mystery and beauty. He reached a hand to the painting and touched oils that were not yet dry, then drew his hand back and studied the red tip of his fingers. The smell of the oil in the paints drew his fingers to his nose. He sniffed the scent, then looked quizzically at Charlie.

"Your paints differ from the Apache's," he said, sniffing his fingers again. "You do not make your paints from that which grows from the earth, or the earth itself?"

"No," Charlie said. "They are made from . . ."

Charlie got no further with his explanation. He stiffened when Cloud Eagle ventured over to his wagon and, reaching inside the back flap, brought out several of his framed paintings.

Charlie glanced over at the other men. They were close friends who had been kind enough to accompany him on this journey of the heart. He could tell that they were nervous at the chief's actions.

But they knew, as did Charlie, that with so many Apache warriors near, it was foolish to consider stopping him.

Charlie turned his worried gaze back to Cloud Eagle, watching guardedly as the Apache chief chose one painting, in particular to admire and study. It was a painting of Charlie's sister Alicia just before she had left Saint Louis with her father   and mother two years ago, when his father had become involved in the newly established Overland Mail stagecoach line. Charlie had stayed behind. He was the curator of the art museum in Saint Louis and had not wanted to give up his position to go to the wild west.

A wire from his sister stating that their mother and father had been killed in cross fire during a fight between renegade Indians and the United States Army, and that she was going to stay in Arizona to continue working on the stagecoach line, had changed everything for Charlie. He feared that Alicia was daring enough even to be a stagecoach driver, and that thought had struck fear into his heart.

After he had made the necessary arrangements for his departure, he had come for her. He had stopped only long enough each evening to make camp and to paint just before sunset.

He cringed even now when he remembered the many times that he had watched his father teaching his sister daring tricks on horses and the art of firing all sorts of firearms. She had developed into a fiery, adventurous young lady of eighteen, and he feared for her life.

Cloud Eagle placed the painting of Alicia before his eyes. He positioned it so that the remaining light of the evening played on it, enabling him to see it better.

Taken by the loveliness of the woman in the painting, Cloud Eagle sucked in a wild breath. This mystically beautiful woman with the pale skin of snow held the color of the skies in her eyes and the flame of the sun in her hair. Her smile was like a thousand suns!

Never had he seen anything like this painting,   or the woman who was captured on it. Her beauty made his heart clap like thunder inside his chest.

He turned to Charlie. "Chief Cloud Eagle wishes to have this painting," he said abruptly. "You will be paid well for it." He gestured with his free hand toward the fresh killthe juicy meat on the travois and the many valuable pelts. "You can choose from the meat or the pelts. Whichever you prefer." He paused as he studied the painting even more closely. "This woman. Her name. Tell me her name. Tell me where I can find her."

Charlie's insides grew cold. He saw the danger in telling this Indian that this was his sister. He was definitely not going to tell him that Alicia was in the Arizona Territory!

And he
wouldn't
part with the painting. It might be the only way to find Alicia in this damnable wild country, where faces might be remembered far longer than a name.

Yet Charlie could not help but hungrily eye the meat. Neither he nor his friends were crack shots when it came to hunting for game. They were all hungry.

But his sister's safety came first.

His friends knew this and did not interfere when he spoke aloud his decision to this Apache chief.

"Sorry," Charlie said determinedly, nervously shuffling his feet. "I can't part with the painting."

"Trade," Cloud Eagle said, once again gesturing toward the fresh kill. "A fair trade. Your painting for meat."

"I'm not going to part with the painting," Charlie said, his voice firm. "Its value cannot   be matched by meat, or anything else. Please give it to me."

Cloud Eagle hesitated, his jaw tight, his heart thundering within his chest. He wanted this painting. Yet he would not take it by force. He did not want to disturb the peace pact that had been signed with the white leaders and blue-coated soldiers at Fort Thomas.

Charlie saw Cloud Eagle's hesitation. Fearing the Indian's anger, he scarcely breathed. It was evident in the Apache's midnight-dark eyes. Charlie expected him to take the painting anyway, and was surprised when he didn't.

Charlie's hands shook when Cloud Eagle thrust the painting into them.

"Her name?" Cloud Eagle said, his tone cold. "Where can I find her?"

When Charlie did not offer a response, Cloud Eagle glared down at the shorter man, who seemed frozen by fear. It seemed to have stolen his ability to speak.

Cloud Eagle looked slowly at the other men as they came and stood in a cluster around the bearded man who held the precious painting.

Cloud Eagle then slapped his thigh, a command for his coyote pets to follow him. He turned and walked stiffly back to his horse and swung himself into his saddle. Red Crow quickly mounted his own steed.

Holding his hand in the air, Cloud Eagle gave the command to leave. He whirled his horse around and rode away in a canter. But he could not deny that the painting had disturbed him. His thoughts were pinned to the woman in the portrait like a deerskin to a tree.

Suddenly he was not himself.   <><><><><><><><><><><><>

Alicia Cline was ready to lock up the stagecoach mail station for the night but stopped when she saw a mail sack in a corner of the room. She placed her hands on her hips and flashed her eyes angrily at Milton Powers. He was slumped in a chair tipping a bottle of whiskey to his lips, his boots propped on her desk.

"Milton, damn it, you forgot to place the second mail sack on the stagecoach," Alicia said, staring at him as he gulped down big swallows of whiskey.

When he didn't respond, she stamped over to him and slapped his feet off her desk. "
And,
Milton, how many times have I told you to keep your damn feet off my desk?" she said, her voice stiff with anger.

Milton looked up at her with bloodshot eyes and laughed sarcastically. "What makes you think I'm gonna take orders from a woman?" he said, pushing himself clumsily up from the chair. He staggered drunkenly over to Alicia and gazed down at her from his lanky, six-foot-four height. "Notice I didn't refer to you as a 'lady.' I ain't never seen you dressed in nothin' but men's clothes." He slapped at the heavy pistol holstered at her waist. "You even wear a gun. I'd say that's anything but ladylike."

His insults made Alicia's eyes waver. She gazed down at her attire. Since she had left Saint Louis, and especially since her parents' deaths, she had almost forgotten what it was like to wear a dress. It was imperative to protect herself from women-hungry men who often had not seen a lady since they left their civilized lives behind. In this land, men outnumbered women almost   one hundred to one. The only way to remain safe was to look and behave like a man.

And she could confess to having learned this art of disguise very well since her parents' untimely deaths. She had grown quite accustomed to wearing men's breeches and shirts, although she had chosen to wear soft, fringed buckskins instead of the stiff, dark clothes that most men wore.

She had even gotten used to tucking her brilliant red hair beneath a wide-brimmed sombrero. And she wouldn't part with her pistol. Not even when, after a long, weary day, it sometimes felt as if it weighed as much as she did.

She stared at her leather cowboy boots. When they had been new, she had kept them spanking clean and free of dust. But now that the newness had worn off and she'd learned that they rubbed blisters on her toes more often than not, she scarcely ran a rag over them or gave them a layer of polish to protect the leather.

Shrugging, she looked up at Milton again. ''How could you have been so lax in your job that you let the stagecoach get away from here without all of the mail sacks?" she said, again placing her hands on her hips. "You're nothing but a dimwit, Milton. When you're drinking, you scarcely know your head from your toes."

"Aw, quit your jawin'," Milton grumbled. With a callused finger, he lifted her chin and smiled down at her. "You know you love me."

She shuddered and slapped his hand away. "Keep your hands off me. You have to know that I'm going to report you to the superintendent in charge," she spat. "I don't know why anyone hired you in the first place. You are nothing but a lazy, no good, drunken bum. . . ."   Then she paled and placed her hands to her cheeks. "No," she gasped. She looked over at the mail sack. She just realized that it might be the one in which she had placed the letter to her brother Charlie, telling him that she had been relocated to a new stage station. The last station where she'd been assigned had burned to the ground. If Charlie decided to come for her, to encourage her to return to Saint Louis with him, as he had threatened in his last letter to her, he wouldn't know how to find her.

She was also afraid that her brother might get lost in the Arizona Territory while looking for her. She had no intention of going back to Saint Louis with him, but Charlie would take more convincing than mere words. He might even try to drag her back to Saint Louis, to a life
he
wanted for her, no matter what she wanted herself.

She scrambled over to the mail sack, opened it, and dumped its contents on the floor. She sat down on the floor, and as she sorted the mail out, she tossed letters aside. When she didn't find the one she was after, she sighed with relief. The letter was in the other bag. And that was good. This was the last mailing that would go out for weeks.

When she began shoveling the mail back inside the bag, her eyes suddenly narrowed on one that showed her handwriting. Her heart sank. In her hasty search, she had not seen it.

"Damn it," she said, giving Milton a harried, frustrated look. She held the letter up. "Do you see this? It's the letter to my brother Charlie. Because of your negligence, he isn't going to know that I've relocated."

"So what?" Milton said casually. He took another long swallow of whiskey, then glared   down at Alicia. "He's probably not comin' anyhow. He's probably feelin' lucky to be rid of you. I know that I'd feel damn lucky if I never saw or heard from you again. You ain't nothin' but trouble. Do you hear? Trouble."

He staggered from the stage station, leaving Alicia with her frustrations. She stared down at the mail. "There's only one thing left to do," she said. "I've got to catch up with the stagecoach. I sure as hell don't want to have to ride clear to Fort Thomas."

Slinging the heavy bag over her left shoulder, she left the stage station in a half run. She cringed at the thought of what her mother would say if she could see her today in the filthy buckskins, or could hear her swearing. She had tried her hardest to raise Alicia as a lady, as sweet and delicate as herself.

But Alicia had followed her father's teachings. Although she sometimes wished that she could dress up in something pretty, the way she had dressed while she was a part of Saint Louis's most affluent circle of society, she could not deny that she was quite content living the free life that she had found in the Arizona Territory.

A man was all that was missing in her life. Recently, she had begun to wonder what it would be like to be kissed and held by a man.

Milton interrupted her train of thought. "Where the hell do you think you're goin'?" he demanded as he walked clumsily toward Alicia as she slung the heavy mail sack onto her horse, behind her saddle.

"I'm taking care of business since you chose not to," Alicia said, giving Milton a stern look.   Now there was a man that she could never have feelings for.

He was worthless. She even suspected that, during one of his drunken sprees, Milton had accidentally started the fire that destroyed the last stage station.

Milton staggered over to her horse and stared drunkenly at the mail sack, then up at Alicia as she swung herself into her saddle. "You ain't goin' anywhere," he said, reaching for the bag.

"Stand away from me and my horse, Milton, or I swear, I'll run right over you," Alicia said, picking up her reins.

"You're takin' off this time of evenin' to catch up with the stagecoach?" he said, his voice rising in pitch.

"I don't see
you
making any effort to correct your mistake," Alicia said, frowning down at him. "So, yes. I'm going to try my damnedest to get the mail where it belongs."

"You're a fool for sure," Milton said, stepping away from her horse.

"I'd rather be accused of being a fool than a drunken bum," Alicia said, snapping her reins. She rode off in a hard gallop, into the sunset.

"Go ahead. Go and get yourself killed," Milton shouted after her. "Who cares anyhow? I know I don't. You don't have the makin's of ever bein' a lady, so what man would care about the likes of you?"

He staggered toward the log cabin, shrugging. "Aw, let her go," he argued with himself when he had one moment of regret, thinking that he ought to go after her. "If the damn Injuns catch up with her, then she won't be around to tattle about my negligence."   He turned and shielded his face from the sunset with one hand. In the distance he could see her riding like a bolt of lightning across the land. "You wench," he said thickly. "You stupid, stubborn, dumb wench."