the Lonely Men (1969) (7 page)

First I squatted down, easing down so my movement would draw no attention, and then I studied the camp through a manzanita growing on the rim.

Squaws were working, children playing. They felt secure here. Nobody had ever followed them into this country, nobody had ever found them here before. For years, for generations, they had been coming here after their raids, after stealing the cattle, the horses, and the women of the Mexicans. Stealing their food, too, and bringing it here and to other places like this ... there must be many of them.

Little Orry was in one of them. How long could we look before they caught us?

How long, then, could we expect to live?

But Orry was my brother's son, and I was a Sackett, and in the Sackett veins the blood ran strong and true. It was our nature and our upbringing.

A few minutes longer I squatted there, watching the camp. Not staring, for staring can be felt, and will make an animal or an Indian uneasy. Then I went back through the trees.

"It's a rancheria," I said, "but I doubt if it is the one we want."

Chapter
6

Whoever it was who had come up the mountain before us had spent a good bit of time studying that camp. There were a-plenty of tracks, knee impressions, and the like, so we could see whoever it was had stayed there quite some time. And then that person had mounted up and ridden on.

We, too, moved on, and the trail we now followed was a deer trail ... or maybe one made by big horn sheep, which leave a somewhat similar track. The only other tracks on the trail were those small hoof prints, or sometimes, when the rider got on and walked, were boot tracks.

We entered soon into a wild and broken country, past towering masses of conglomerate and streams of a dull opalescent water, slightly bitter to the taste, but nonetheless good for drinking. Many times we were forced to dismount and lead our mounts, for large limbs or out-thrusts of rock projected over the trail.

Among some pines we pulled off and got down from our saddles. Tampico Rocca hunkered down and stared at the ground. Spanish Murphy glanced over at me. "Tell ... you think we're going to find that boy?"

"Uh-huh."

Well, I knew what he was feeling. The quiet. It was getting us. We were in the heart of Indian country, and we were all jumpy. There wasn't one of us who didn't know what it would mean if we were seen. It would mean a running fight... And our only choice would be to try to get away.

Once it was known we were around we'd have no chance to get close to those children. So far we'd had luck, with the skill of Rocca to provide a good part of it -- his skill and his knowledge of the country.

Presently we moved on, and now we saw Indian tracks from time to time. Up to now we had been traveling high, lonely country where Indians seldom went, but now we were descending slowly, getting into the areas where there was game, and where at any time we might encounter Indians.

"There's another rancheria ahead," Rocca soon said.

This one was also in a hollow, with a towering cliff behind it, and low, rolling pine-clad hills around. The rancheria lay in a nest of boulders and trees, with a small stream curving around the encampment. Even as we came up through the pines, several horsemen arrived. They rode into the area accompanied by a small swirl of dust and dropped to the ground. There were six Apaches in the group, four of them armed with bows, two with rifles.

Two of them were carrying chunks of meat, probably from slaughtered cattle. A third was handing down some articles of clothing, evidently stripped from some Mexican or his wife -- from our distance we could not determine which.

Suddenly Battles grabbed my arm and pointed. Several children had come up, carrying bundles of sticks. At least one appeared to be a white boy, his face was partly turned from them. He was a tall youngster, perhaps eight or nine years old.

This could be the place. Whatever else we did, we must talk to that boy.

I was conscious of the fresh smell of the pines and of crushed pine needles underfoot. There was a faint smell of smoke from the camp, and I could make out the sound of Indian voices speaking. Inside me, I was still -- waiting, thinking.

If there were other white children around, that boy would know about them. But what if he had already become close to being an Apache? Taken young enough, many American or Mexican children had no wish to leave the Apaches. To speak to him was a risk, but it must be done.

Spanish, he looked over at me. "We got us a job, boy," he said.

"I never figured it to be easy." I studied the rancheria, and I did not feel happy about the situation.

"We're too close," Rocca said. "We'd better move back. If the wind changed a mite, the dogs could smell us."

So we moved back among the trees and, weaving around a little, we found ourselves a tree-shaded hollow with a lot of boulders around and some big trees.

It was a perfect place to hide, and we were out of the wind there.

But I was worried. When I traveled alone, as I most often did, I had nobody to worry about but myself, and if I got into trouble there was only my own scalp to lose. This shape-up was entirely different, for these men had come along only to help me. If anything happened to them I'd have it on my mind.

We were here, though, and we had a job to do. "Rocca," I said, "is it likely that boy yonder would ever be left alone?"

"I doubt it. Depend on how long he's been with them, and how much they've come to trust him. There's a chance maybe."

"He'd be likely to know about other white youngsters, wouldn't he?"

"It's likely. Word gets around, and the Apache children would know, and they'd be apt to speak of it. At least when I was a boy in those Apache camps I knew most of what went on."

For the time being there was nothing much we could do, so the others stretched out to catch a little sleep, and I worked up to the bluff to get a better look than we'd had before.

The camp was quiet. The squaws never stopped working, of course, always busy at something, and a few youngsters played around. One of the Apache braves we had seen ride into camp sat cross-legged in front of his wickiup. He was a stoop-shouldered but strongly made man of about my own age, and he had a new Winchester that was never far from his hand. Even here, in their own hide-out, they never let up.

After a while I returned to camp and Spanish took my place up on the bluff.

Under a low tree I settled down for some rest.

When I awoke I fought myself back to reality with an effort. I'd been dog-tired, and whilst I usually was ready to wake up on the slightest sound, this time I had really slept.

The first thing I noticed was the silence. There was no fire, of course, and there was little light. It was late afternoon, and under the trees it was already shading down to dusk.

For a moment I lay quiet, listening. Raising my head, I looked around. Over yonder there was a saddle -- I could see the faint shine of it. I could see nothing else, nor could I hear any sound but the soft rustling of the leaves overhead.

My right hand moved for my rifle, closed around the action. A shot fired here would bring Apaches around us like bees from a kicked hive.

Carefully, I eased back the blanket, moved my feet out, and then drew them up and rolled to my knees. Glancing to where John J. Battles was lying, I could see his body under a blanket. He was asleep ... at least he was not moving.

Rocca was nowhere in sight, his bed was empty. We had purposely scattered out to sleep. It gave us that much more of a chance if the camp was attacked.

A moment longer I waited, then came up swiftly and with one long step was molded into the shadow of a tree. And still nothing stirred.

Nevertheless, I knew it wasn't just a case of worry with me. Somebody or something was prowling our camp, and we were too close to those Apaches for comfort. At the same time I know that the Apache, generally speaking, won't fight after dark. He has the feeling that the soul of a man killed in the night wanders forever in darkness. Of a sudden, something moved near me. There was no light but that of the stars. Here and there a tree trunk stood out, or a leaf caught the shine of a reflection.

It was a haunted place, this camp of ours, a corner among the crags, a place where cliffs reared up or fell away, where broken rocks lay among the trees.

There were so many shadows that one saw nothing clearly.

Slowly I lowered the butt of my rifle to the ground. At my belt was a bowie knife, sharp enough to shave with -- in fact, I often did shave with it. But it was my hands on which I would depend this time, hard work had made them strong, had built muscles into my arms and shoulders. For little softness had come into my life, little but hard riding and harder work. I waited, my hands ready.

The movement was there again, not a sound so much as a suggestion. Then it was the breathing that warned me ... only breathing, and I reached out with my hands.

Something slipped through my hands like a ghost. My hands touched it, grasped, and the thing wasn't there ... a faint grasp, and my fingers clutched only hair ... Then it was gone!

Battles sat up. "Tell? What is it?"

"A ghost, I think." I spoke softly. "Whatever it is, I wish it would believe we're not enemies." But whatever it was, was gone. A couple of hours later, by the light of day, we found tracks enough. Tip toe tracks of a small foot I felt a shudder go through me, and Rocca noticed it. "What?" he said. "You are afraid?"

"I was remembering ... someone who is gone," I said. "But these tracks are not hers. They are small, like hers, and the steps are quick, like hers ... but she is dead."

Tampico Rocca crossed himself. "She haunts you?"

"No ... it is only a memory. Her name was Ange, and I found her trail first, like this. I lost her again, like this. But Ange is dead. She was murdered," I said, "up in the Mogollon country."

"Ah!" That was Spanish. "You are that Sackett!" He looked at me thoughtfully. "I heard talk of it. I was in Cherry Creek then, but everybody knew the story ... and how your family came to help."

He looked at me over the tip of his cigarette, and I could guess what he was thinking. In the western lands where all news came by word of mouth, men quickly became legend, they became larger than life. It was so with Ben Thompson, Wild Bill, Mike Fink, or Davy Crockett. The stories grew with telling.

"The boy we're hunting," I said, "is my brother Orrin's boy. Orrin was one of them who rode to the Mogollon."

"I never had a family," Spanish said. "I was always alone."

John J. tamped tobacco into his pipe. "Most men are alone," he said. "We come into life alone, we face our worst troubles alone, and we are alone when we die."

"It was the girl we tracked," I said. I'd been looking around while we talked.

"She needed grub. She's taken some bread and some dried apples, and maybe a little jerky."

And then we were quiet again.

We knew what we had to do, and the waiting was hard, for we were men who preferred action. Our way of life had been to act ... there was rarely need for contemplation. We were men who moved swiftly, surely, and we lived or died by the success of our movement. So to wait now came hard. To wander in the mountains added to our danger, and to wait here was risk, but a man who does not move leaves no tracks.

So we watched and waited, for it was all we could do, and even just watching worried me for men who are being watched become aware of it.

The white boy we had seen appeared again, more than once, but always with Indian boys around him. And then, after another long day of watching, I saw him take a spear and go alone along a trail between some rocks. Like a cat I was off the rock where I watched, nodding to Rocca as I passed him.

Spanish went up to watch from where I had been, and John J. went to the horses -- we saddled them each morning -- to be ready in case of need.

Tampico Rocca was a ghost on the trail, moving without sound. We snaked down among the rocks, crawled over great boulders, and came down to where we could await the boy.

Was he changed? Had he become an Apache? If so, he would shout when he saw us.

Only he had no chance. Soundlessly Rocca dropped to the trail behind him, put one hand over the boy's mouth, and lifted him into the brush, where we crouched.

He looked wild-eyed with fright, then seeing we were white men he tried to speak. Slowly Rocca took his hand from his mouth.

"Take me away!" he whispered. "My name is Brook. Harry Brook."

"How long have they had you?"

"Two years, I think. Maybe not that long, but a long time."

"Where are the other white children? The Creeds and Orry Sackett."

"The Creeds? I have heard of them. They are in the next rancheria." He pointed.

"Over there."

"And the Sackett boy?"

"I do not know. I never heard of another boy. There is a girl with the Creed boys, but she is only five ... very small."

Well ... something seemed to drain away inside me. Had they killed him then? Had they killed Orrin's son? Battles asked the question.

"Nobody was killed," the boys said. "I was in camp when they brought them in, the Creed boys and the girl."