Stand to Horse

by Andre Norton

  The valley still seemed deserted. But as they strained their eyes against the glare of the sun, a familiar dun shadow bobbed along, backtracking its own trail, covering the ground at an awkward speed. And as the camel went by, Ritchie saw the telltale red trickle down its nigh shoulder and the arrow shaft sticking in its hide. Some Apache had not been able to resist such an interesting target. So menace now lay ahead as well as behind—they were being boxed in.

  "Here they come!" warned Herndon.

  Come they did, a thin fan of red-turbaned figures flitted over the edge of the basin and disappeared among the rocks. Ritchie was sure he had sighted a small white blot following on the heels of one of them—Diego had not given up the hunt.

  For the two on the tower ledge there was perhaps one slim chance in ten thousand. Apaches were master trackers, but the trail which led over bare rock was doubly hard to trace. If the dragoons could lie quiet, they might be passed by without discovery. It was the only chance they had.

  Ritchie nipped his lower lip between his teeth and bit down hard. The Apaches were showing some contempt for their quarry; they were not even keeping to cover now. Two had trotted out into plain sight.

  Slowly they were working down toward the point where the climb had started. Ritchie blinked salt sweat out of his eyes. He could hardly draw a full breath. Black flies bored into his flesh, and he dared not beat them off.

  But the worst was not yet. The trackers had reached the foot of the pinnacle; their guttural speech drifted up. But another sound puzzled Ritchie, a faint slithering as if I something was slipping across the stone by his side. With infinite caution he turned his head one inch at a time.

  A yard away and gliding nearer was a black rattler. And the snake was already suspicious and angry.

  17

  “This Is as Good a Place To Die as Any”

  The snake was coiling, and after it coiled—! Ritchie cringed and then froze as he watched the flat head sway, the thread-tongue flicker. Unable to turn his eyes away, he sensed rather than saw Herndon move.

  There was an odd smacking sound, and a splotch of brown liquid splashed on that ugly head. The coils writhed as the blinded snake lashed around close to the edge of the ledge. Then it went over, falling straight into the knot of savages gathered below. The Sergeant's hand jerked his companion back with scant feeling for scrapes and bruises.

  "Behind that bit of wall—"

  There was no need for silence now. That floundering reptile had betrayed them as a surprised shout from below had testified. They fled, bumping carbine, rifle, and canteen along with them.

  In some forgotten storm the tower's top rocks had crashed down to make a natural breastwork. Herndon was already making a pile of small stones he wrenched out of the ruins. When he had enough to hand, he got to his knees and pitched. The stone he hurled went over and down, its landing marked by another furious yell.

  Ritchie built up his own pile of ammunition. Unless the Apaches could win up to their level, the beseiged still had a chance. But the familiar ping of a carbine put an end to that faintest of hopes. Ritchie dropped flat and lay looking up at the white furrow banded across one of the top stones of the breastwork.

  "On that other pinnacle—hiding out like a lizard!" Herndon explained briefly.

  There was a tower on that pinnacle, too. And if that sniper got on the top of it, he could pick them off at his leisure.

  “If he gets up in that tower—"

  The Sergeant shook his head. ''These towers must have been entered only by ladders through the roof—there're no wall openings. And I don't think they'll try to climb-not while we keep an eye on them. But they have got us nailed here. And it's a waiting game in which they hold all the aces."

  "If we had those extra canteens—" Ritchie had shaken the one by his hand, and the answer was not pleasant.

  Herndon snorted. "And if we had a battery, we could rival Napoleon. If that fool snake hadn't gone over—"

  "What did you do to it?"

  The Sergeant's shadow grin showed for a second. "Spit tobacco juice in its eyes. Rocked it right out of battle formation, didn't I?"

  "Listen!" Had he or had he not heard that faintest of sounds, not unlike the slithering advance of the reptile? "Would-be-heroes!" Herndon's attack had a speed even the rattler might have envied. His stone whizzed, and he flopped back into shelter before the sniper was ready. The bullet sang by too high and too late.

  "Look!" Ritchie dug with his hands into the rubble of the fallen tower. What he uncovered was a thin slab of stone, smooth and carefully edged.

  "If we could push this over the wall, lean it with the end down on the ledge, we could roll rocks down it and maybe they would bounce off just about on a line with the place where we climbed—"

  Herndon's eyes gleamed. "We'll have to get rid of our friend across the way before we can rig it. He'd drill us both if we left cover to move it. Let me have your hat."

  Using both their shirts and Ritchie's hat, the Sergeant constructed a bundle that might just pass as the head and shoulders of a dragoon. Having punched it into the best shape possible, he passed it to Ritchie.

  "When I snap my fingers, let Zero here get a little careless—as artistically as you can—"

  Ritchie nodded as the Sergeant squirmed around to face the other tower, Tuttle's rifle ready, his eyes squinting against the sun. At the faint sound Ritchie raised Zero, trying to mimic the motions of a man crawling behind the barrier, holding his body just a little too high for safety.

  Zero was almost torn from his hands as a slug drilled the headless hat. And simultaneously the rifle cracked in reply.

  The Sergeant's voice had a purring note in it as he said, "See that spot of red—to the left of the needle rock?"

  Ritchie saw it. It was very still.

  "Now let's get to work before someone else mans that post!"

  Ritchie tugged and pulled on one side of the slab and Herndon on the other, reckless of barked fingers and raw flesh, expecting every moment to feel the blow of a shot. But at last one end dropped on the other side of the barrier, and Herndon brought up a reasonably round stone to try. It rolled down and popped squarely over the spot they had climbed. Herndon laughed.

  "Here's to the Tower Artillery!" His thirst-husky voice probably even reached those below. "Bring up the ammunition, m' lads!"

  The ammunition had to be properly shaped to roll, and they discovered to their dismay that the number of available stones was none too great. But all they could grub up were piled within reaching distance of the slab. When that job was done, Herndon set out on a small shelf in the wall a row of bullets, a very short line of them. When he had put them all out, he had an odd look.

  "There's our future. Ten for our friends, and one for yours truly. How about yours?"

  Ritchie investigated his supply. He could not match the Sergeant's display. Only seven loads remained for the carbine. From these Herndon separated one.

  "When it comes to the end"—he might have been explaining any ordinary procedure to a recruit—"kick off your boot. Take this." He had been twisting a bit of hide thong between his fingers, and now he handed it to his companion. At either end was a loop. "This loop on your trigger, the muzzle to your forehead, and your toe in the other loop. One jerk will do the business for you."

  He was making another thong for his own weapon. "However"—he glanced to where that red dot lay on the neighboring pinnacle—"we shall contrive to send as many of them ahead of us as we can. Aha!"

  A thin curl of smoke was tailing up from an outcrop out of range. Signal smoke to draw in reinforcements!

  "Holla, Soldados! Now you die!" Triumph once more in that familiar shout which might have come from anywhere.

  "Diego. That's one brown monkey I'd like to get my sights on before the last rush!" said the Sergeant between his gritted teeth.

  ''But would he lead the charge?"

  "Indians don't follow men who aren't battle leaders. And Diego has some power ove
r them or he could never have kept them on our trail this way. We're pretty small fry to be hunted down so persistently. Small fry—and unlucky!"

  It had been ill luck that had dogged them all right, thought Ritchie. The ambush and getting lost in this country, Sturgis' death and Tuttle's, the camel refusing to be caught—and all the rest.

  "Two day ago that might have saved us."

  "What?" Ritchie was pulled out of his own thoughts.

  "That storm."

  There was a patch of dark cloud over the mountains, a handsbreadth of spreading gloom. But Herndon had already forgotten it.

  "Artillery!"

  Ritchie was ready. Their rolling stones hit the slab and were funneled down the cliff. They could hear that rattling descent and then a dull thud and a muffled cry. Ritchie answered with an exclamation of his own as a branding iron seemed to be laid for an instant against his jaw.

  "They've manned the sniper's post again," Herndon observed dryly.

  Ritchie's fingers came away from his face red and sticky, but the cut was only a shallow one.

  A ragged whip of light snapped across the sky, striking on the ridge across the tower valley. That patch of dark cloud had spread fast.

  There was an answering fusillade from the sniper's pinnacle. Two of them must be there now, and they were keeping up such a fire that the dragoons dared not use the slab. If that continued, it could well cover any climbers. And then all that would be left for them was Herndon's trick with trigger and toe.

  The Sergeant brought out his battered journal and was cramming it into the small bag that had held his extra ammunition. Pulling the string tight, he thrust it into a dark hole, which must lead straight to the heart of the ruined tower. He wriggled close to push it the full length of his arm.

  When he caught Ritchie watching him, he appeared embarrassed. "It won't ever be found; sure, I know that. But at least they won't tear it up. And there's always that faint chance that someday someone else will find the Torreones.

  "I had some delusions once that I was going to be an explorer—find new lands and map them for the world. Then everything went wrong for me, and I came out here." He was watching the sniper's pinnacle, his finger on the trigger. "I've had my wish. It would be good to know more about these towers—if we had time. But time is the one thing the old gods are never lavish with. Whee—that must have struck!"

  The spear of purplish light which had been flung across the mountain almost blinded them.

  "Now!" Herndon shouted. "Up with Zero again!"

  Ritchie grabbed wildly for the dummy and hoisted it. A shot sang, and Herndon fired in return.

  ''Let's hope that will discourage them a little." He reloaded swiftly.

  "You know"—he brought the rifle back into firing position—"this is as good a place to die as any. They can't rush us as they would like to, and we have some chance to choose how we're going to end—which is more than those poor devils who get trapped in the canyons have. This may not be the only battle this valley has seen, but it's going to be one of the best!"

  Ritchie rolled a stone from hand to hand. "Shall I try the artillery again?" He was glad to find his voice as normal and level as usual. "That wind is coming up, and the sound may cover climbers—"

  "Take it careful when you do. I'll try to cover you—"

  Ritchie reached up and felt along with his left hand for the edge of the slab. And it was well he had been so cautious, for a shot chipped the stone only an inch from his questing fingers. He heaved the rock he had been holding and hoped for the best. But the angle of that last shot bothered him. Surely it had not come from the other pinnacle. Herndon confirmed his suspicions.

  "They seem to have discovered the back door. We're between two fires now."

  The Sergeant was tugging off his worn boot. Ritchie, a nerve twitching under his eye, did the same. The loop of hide was small, but he forced his toe into it. Tight but it would serve.

  It was so gloomy now that it was difficult to see the pinnacle of the snipers. And under cover of the storm all the Apaches must be drawing in, a pack of wolves about a buffalo, still wary but ready for the finish. Lightning flashed again, and by its searing beam Ritchie saw a crawling shadow. He fired.

  As if that shot of his had been a signal, sound rose to fill the basin. It began as a low wailing moan that swelled into what might have been a scream torn from a hundred tortured throats. About them the very air curdled with that weird singing. Then, as suddenly, it was gone. They crouched shoulder to shoulder waiting.

  Again the moaning swept along the tower-topped pinnacles, as if those who once dwelt there were raising their voices in a last cry of misery and death. Ritchie could not still the shaking of his hands. Nothing he had ever heard in his life had sounded so fearful.

  When for the third time, that keening began to sweep along the ridges, there was a chorus of sharp cries from the basin. Herndon shook alertness into Ritchie.

  "Out on the ledge—" The Sergeant had to yell to be heard above the wailing. "Shoot to kill!"

  They scrambled over the barrier and looked down into the basin. A knot of red-turbaned men huddled there, facing outward as if to front an invisible enemy. As they watched, two more Apaches fled across the open ground to join their kin.

  If Herndon fired, the sound was swallowed up in the rousing crescendo of the storm. But one of the Apaches was falling. His fellows stampeded away from him as if they believed he had been struck down by supernatural forces.

  Lightning made a burst of purple light to run straight down the cliff opposite them, blinding them for the moment. When Ritchie could see again, the Apaches were cowering flat on the ground.

  Then the rain broke. It came, moving like a curtain with the wind to drive it, a wind which set rocks rolling from the walls of the ruined tower behind them. The Sergeant had risen to his elbows and, shielding his eyes against the drive of the rain, was trying to sight the Apaches when a large stone bounced once on the ledge between them and went over. Ritchie simply lay still, letting the falling water beat down the length of his body, licking at the streams of it which ran across his sunbaked face and parched and broken lips.

  "Can't stay here!" To be heard, Herndon had to drop his head almost check to cheek with Ritchie. "Be smashed flat by a slide—"

  He pulled the carbine out of Ritchie's hands and shoved it and the rifle to the back of the ledge.

  "Take your knife— Climb down into the open!" The words were torn away by the wind, but Ritchie had heard enough to start him moving.

  With his knife between his teeth he went over the lip of the narrow passage. The stones cut his feet, but he reached the ground speedily. Nature was now aiming rocks in an artillery barrage of her own. Ritchie had barely time to move aside when Herndon came down the same way.

  They were still concealed by the debris of other rock-slides and the fury of the rain. But the Sergeant flattened himself against a rock and began to move in the general direction of where the Apaches had last been sighted.

  Ritchie was about to follow when a snarling white thing launched out of the shadows. Diego's dog! Instinctively he threw up his arm, just in time to cover his throat. Fangs ripped his flesh before the dog tried for another hold. Ritchie stabbed desperately with his knife and felt the blade bite at least once. But the dog crouched snarling, lips curled back over viciously sharp teeth.

  Ritchie kicked, trying to stop the third attack. His heel sent the small beast spinning, to come up with deadening force against a rock. Hoping it was stunned Ritchie got away as quick as he could.

  The curtain of the rain still hung heavy, but it did not entirely hide the bank of the ancient river which was deep-cut, arroyo fashion, in the soil. And down this was now moving a murky wall of water five feet or more in height.

  There were men below scrambling to clear the racing flood. The majority were clambering up the opposite side of the stream; only two came toward Ritchie. One of these appeared to be crippled; he crawled along on hands an
d one knee, dragging his right leg as a dead weight. When he reached the slope up which he must win to safety, he tried to pull himself up, twisting painfully to clutch the soil which only crumbled under his frantic fingers. His companion paid him no heed but threw himself at the rise and made up it in all haste.

  The wall of water moved on, beating down sand and gravel. Ritchie watched the crippled Apache turn to look. His hands dropped to his sides, and he crouched, a snarl on his thick wide mouth, facing death. The water swirled, and he was gone as the flood made a barrier between the survivors. It had grown so dark that Ritchie had lost sight of the men across the stream.

  But there was the matter of the man who had safely reached this side. Ritchie hunched his shoulders against the force of the rain. The fellow hadn't carried a gun, but in this dark a knife would be even more dangerous. And where was Herndon?

  Ritchie moved along the riverbank, trying to see in all directions at once. The roaring of the water was almost as hard on the nerves as the moaning wind had been.

  And it was this roaring which covered the sounds of the Against the light-colored rock of one of the pinnacles he saw a dark shape like a charging animal. And before he fight until Ritchie almost stumbled over the fighters, could move, it threw itself forward to strike with a forceful impact against another body. There was a flash, which might have been a knife, but when they tangled, it was more flesh against flesh than steel against steel.

  Who was friend or who was foe in that tangled mass Ritchie could not tell. With his knife in his hand he could only wait and hope for some sign to identify the wrestlers. One of them was on his back now, and the other knelt upon him. This time the knife was in that hand which came down in one hard, driving stroke. The man on the ground quivered, and his head rolled limply back.

  The victor hesitated a long moment as if looking for further signs of life. Then he hurled his knife from him before he rolled over convulsively to lie almost as still as the man he had just stabbed. Ritchie's knife went back into the sheath; then he leaped across the trampled ground. He linked his hands under the victor's armpits and tugged him farther up the slope.