Sacketts 14 - Galloway

by Galloway

  thataway."

  The four men at the table got up quietly and went out of the door, walking

  carefully. Galloway Sackett finished his drink, then walked over to the other

  man's table.

  "Mr. Shadow? I'm Galloway Sackett."

  "It is a name not unknown to me. Sit down, will you? What will you have?"

  "I'm going to have some coffee and some grub, but what I really want is

  information. The bartender told me you knew the San Juan country."

  "I do."

  "About a week ago I ran into a bunch of Jicarillas and they had my brother.

  They'd started to work on him. I was alone, but figured if I could create a fuss

  he'd cut loose on his own. I did, and he did."

  "He got away?"

  "He surely did. And dropped clean off the world. I hunted for him and they did.

  Those Jicarillas weren't about to lose him so they taken in after him. He was

  stark naked and had his hands tied, but he got away."

  "He's dead, then."

  "Not Flagan. We Sacketts don't die easy, and Flagan is a tough man. He's been up

  the creek and over the mountain. He's fit Comanches and Arapahoes on the buffalo

  plains, and about ever' kind of man or animal. He's a tough man."

  "That San Juan country is tough. It's the most beautiful country in the world,

  but about two-thirds of it stands on end."

  Shadow paused, waiting while the bartender placed coffee and food on the table.

  Then he asked, "What do you want me to do?"

  "Tell me about it. How the streams run, the best ways to get through the

  mountains, where I'm liable to run into Indians. I'm going in after him."

  "You're bucking a stacked deck, my friend. You'll need an outfit."

  "That's another thing. The bartender said you had horses. I need a spare for

  Flagan to ride when I find him, and I'll need a couple of pack horses for grub

  and the like."

  Shadow took a thin cigar from his pocket and lighted it. He studied the end of

  it for a moment, then said, "If I didn't have some business to attend to, I'd go

  with you."

  "Twenty-four hours, you gave him. Do you think he'll move?"

  "Yes."

  Galloway glanced at Shadow thoughtfully. "He must know you, this Fasten gent."

  "He knows me. He stole cattle and killed men in the Mimbres country. He wiped

  out a lot of us, then pulled out and drove the cattle clear out of the country.

  I took in after him."

  "I lost the trail, then found it again. Meanwhile he'd settled down here, hired

  a bunch of reasonably honest hands, and then he cooked up that Clover Three

  brand. Guess he had an idea it couldn't be blotted, so I did it, just as a

  challenge. So he sent a hired man after me, but I remembered the man from Texas,

  and he did not remember me."

  "How'd that happen?"

  Shadow shrugged. "I was a teacher at Waco University. Our paths did not cross in

  a way he would notice."

  "You were a teacher?"

  He shrugged. "One does what one can. I needed the job, they needed the teacher.

  In fact, they wanted me to stay on, but the pay was small and I was restless. I

  had come to America to hunt for gold."

  He glanced at Galloway again. "Are you related to Orrin Sackett?"

  "He's kin."

  "He defended me in a shooting case. My first one, in fact. It was a little

  matter of a horse. My horse was stolen. I hunted the man down and he drew a

  pistol and I shot him. Someone advised me to hire Orrin Sackett and I did ...

  fortunately."

  They finished their coffee, talked idly of various things, and then Shadow stood

  up. "I have a cabin down the road apiece. If you'd like you may join me. There's

  an empty bunk, and you're welcome."

  The cabin was small but comfortable. There were Navajo rugs on the floors,

  curtains at the windows, and a couple of dozen books.

  "I envy you the books," Galloway said. "School was a rare time thing for us.

  Mostly it was Ma teaching us from the Bible, and she read a couple of stories to

  us written by Walter Scott. Flagan an' me, we got our learning in the woods with

  our Winchesters."

  "Your brother is a woodsman? Not just a cowhand?"

  "We grew up in the Cumberland country. We learned from the Cherokees. Given a

  chance Flagan could get along most anywhere."

  "Then he might make it. He might just be alive."

  It was the first time he had slept in a bed in weeks, but Galloway slept well,

  and awakened with the sun. Shadow was already outside but a minute or two later

  he came in.

  "I just had word. Fasten left the country. I've started some men rounding up my

  cattle, and the others."

  Galloway Sackett dressed. Somewhere in the country far to the north and east his

  brother was either dead or fighting for his very existence. Somehow he must find

  him. The night before, Shadow had carefully outlined the lay of the country, how

  the rivers ran, the Animas, the Florida, and the La Plata, and Galloway, knowing

  his brother's mind as he knew his own, was trying to figure out what Flagan

  would have done when he got away.

  He would have headed for the mountains, and the first trail he'd found had

  pointed north. It was Flagan's trail, but that of the Apaches following him as

  well.

  Flagan would head into the hills, try and find some place to hole up. He would

  need some clothes, and he would need shelter and food. In the mountains, with

  luck, he could find what he needed.

  "Sackett?" Shadow called from the door. "Get your gear together. I've saddled

  our horses and we're packed for the trip."

  "We?"

  "I'm going with you."

  Chapter IV

  For a week I rested beside the creek, keeping hidden when possible. I treated my

  feet alternately with the salve I had made and leaves of the Datura, and the

  soles began to heal.

  Twice I snared rabbits, once I knocked down a sage hen. There were yampa roots,

  Indian potatoes, and I found a rat's nest containing nearly a bushel of

  hazelnuts. The fare was scant but I was making out.

  By the end of the week I'd completed a bow and some arrows, and had killed a

  deer. With the piece of elk hide, softened by its burial in the earth, I made

  moccasins. Marking out the soles by tracing my feet with charcoal, I then cut

  out an oval as long as my two feet, cut it in half, and in the middle of each

  squared-off end I cut a slit long enough for my foot to get into, then cut

  another slit to make a T. I now had the upper for each moccasin and using a

  thorn for an awl I punched holes to sew the uppers to the soles. Finally I

  punched holes along each side of the slit to take a drawstring.

  One of the first things I'd done was to make a shelter hidden well back in a

  clump of willows. Crawling back into the middle of the thickest clump I could

  find, I cut off some brush, enough to make a sleeping space. Then I drew the

  willows together overhead and tied them, allowing others to stand up to mask

  what I had done.

  This wasn't a shelter I built all at once. First I had just crawled among the

  willows to sleep where I'd not be easily found, then I widened it for more room,

  and the willows I cut I wove in overhead and around the sides to make it snugger
>
  and warmer. After a week of work the tunnel was six feet long and masked by

  tying two growing willows a little closer together once I was inside.

  Twice I saw deer just too far off to risk a shot. The one buckskin I had was not

  enough to make a shot.

  Living in such a way leaves no time for rest. Between the two slopes, the

  stream, and the narrow bottom of the canyon, I made out. Several times I caught

  fish, never large enough, and found clumps of sego lily and ate the bulbs.

  Gradually over that week the stiffness and soreness began to leave my muscles

  and my feet began to heal.

  Yet I was facing the same thing that faced every hunting and food-gathering

  people. Soon a man has eaten all that's available close by and the game grows

  wary. Until men learned to plant crops and herd animals for food they had of

  necessity to move on ... and on.

  Most of what I'd done to make myself comfortable must be left behind, and it

  worried me that I had no better weapons. My feet were better, but the skin was

  tender and I daren't walk very far at any one time. I'd been sparing of the

  hazelnuts for they were the best of my food, but at last they gave out, too. On

  the ninth day I gathered my few possessions and started out.

  Back up at the forks of the creek in Tennessee they don't raise many foolish

  children, and the foolish ones don't live long enough to get knee-high to a

  short sheep. This was Indian country, so I taken it easy. My weapons weren't fit

  for fighting and my feet were too sore for running.

  When I'd traveled about a half mile I sat down to study out the land. The canyon

  was widening out, and there was plenty of deer sign. Twice I saw tracks of a

  mountain lion, a big one.

  By nightfall I'd covered four miles, resting often. The canyon had widened to a

  valley and the stream joined a larger river that flowed south. I could see the

  place where they flowed together, right up ahead. North of me the country seemed

  to flatten out, with towering snow-covered peaks just beyond. Those peaks must

  be the San Juans Tell Sackett had spoken of. I knew this country only by

  hear-tell, and when I'd been running ahead of those Jicarillas I'd not been

  paying much mind to landmarks.

  Working my way over to the brush and trees that followed the canyon wall, I

  hunkered down to study out the land. And that was how I saw those Utes before

  they saw me.

  They were coming up from the south and they had about twenty riderless horses

  with them, and a few of those horses looked almighty familiar. They passed nigh

  me, close enough to see they were a war party returning from some raid. They had

  bloody scalps, and it looked like they had run into those Jicarillas. Ambushing

  an Apache isn't an easy thing to do but it surely looked like they'd done it.

  Trying to steal a horse ran through my mind, but I made myself forget it. My

  feet were in no shape for travel and I couldn't stand another chase. My best bet

  was to head east toward the Animas where I'd heard there were some prospectors.

  Fact is, I was hungry most of the time. What I'd been finding was scarcely

  enough to keep soul and body together, and down on the flat it was harder to

  find what I needed. I found some Jimson weed and cut a few leaves to put in my

  moccasins. I'd used it for saddle sores and knew it eased the pain and seemed to

  help them to heal, but it was dangerous stuff to fool around with, and many

  Indians won't touch it.

  Studying out the ground I saw a field of blue flowers, a kind of phlox the

  Navajo used to make a tea that helped them sing loudly at the Squaw Dance, and

  was also a "medicine" used for the Navajo Wind Chant. But I found nothing to eat

  until night when I caught a fine big trout in an angle of the stream, spearing

  it with more luck than skill, and then as I was making camp I found some Indian

  potatoes. So I ate well, considering.

  When the fish was eaten I huddled by my capful of fire and wished for a cabin, a

  girl, and a meal waiting, for I was a lonesome man with little enough before me

  and nothing behind but troubles. Soon a cricket began to sing near my fire, so I

  made care to leave him be. There's a saying in the mountains that if you harm a

  cricket his friends will come and eat your socks. A hard time they would have

  with me, not having socks or anything else.

  Galloway was no doubt eating his belly full in some fine restaurant or house,

  fining up on beef and frijoles whilst I starved in the woods. It is rare enough

  that I feel sorry for myself but that night I did, but what is the old saying

  the Irish have? The beginning of a ship is a board; of a kiln, a stone; and the

  beginning of health is sleep.

  I slept.

  Cold it was, and the dew heavy upon the grass and upon me as well, but I slept

  and the wind whispered in the aspen leaves, and in the darkness the taste of

  smoke came to my tongue, and the smell of it to my nose. Cold and dark it was

  when the smell of it awakened me, and I sat up, shivering with a chill that

  chattered my teeth. Listening into the night I heard nothing, but then my eye

  caught a faint gleam and I looked again and it was a dying fire, not fifty yards

  off.

  Slowly and carefully I got to my feet. Indians. At least a dozen, and one of

  them awake and on guard. They must have made camp after I fell asleep, although

  it was late for Indians to be about, but come daylight they would surely find

  me. Easing my feet into my moccasins, I gathered what I had to carry and slipped

  away. When I was well away from their camp and in the bottom, I started to run.

  The earth was soft underfoot, and the one thing I needed now was distance. They

  would find my camp in the morning and come after me. I ran and walked for what

  must have been a couple of hours, and then I went into the stream.

  The moon was up and the whole country was bathed in such a white beauty a man

  could not believe, the aspens silvery bright, the pines dark and still. The cold

  water felt good to my feet but because the current was swift and the footing

  uncertain, I took my time. After awhile I came out on the bank and sat down, my

  muscles aching and weary, my feet sore. Carefully I dried them with handfuls of

  grass and clumps of soft sage.

  Light was breaking when I started again. Within the hour they would be on my

  trail, and they would move much faster than I could. I did not know the Utes,

  but the stories I'd heard were mixed, and this was their country.

  Now I moved from rock to rock, carrying a small flat rock in my hand to put down

  wherever I might leave a footprint. The rock left a mark but it was indefinite

  and might have been caused by any number of things. The Utes might find me, but

  I did not intend it should be easy, and I could drop the rock I carried and step

  from it to some other surface that would leave no mark.

  Something rustled in the brush. Turning sharply I was only in time to see leaves

  moving where something had passed by. Crouching near a rock, I waited, but

  nothing came. Moving toward the brush, spear poised, I found only the faintest

  of tracks ... the wolf.

  He was with me still, a rare thing for a lone wolf to stalk a man for
so long a

  time. Yet he was out there now, in the brush, stalking me for a kill. Still,

  there must be easier game.

  Twice I made my way through thick groves of aspen, trying to leave no sign of my

  passing, yet always alert for a place to hide. By now they had found my fire,

  and were on my trail.

  My feet were beginning to bleed again. I heard the cry of an eagle that was no

  eagle, and the cry came from where no eagle would be. One of them had found some

  sign I'd left and was calling the others.

  They would find me now, for they could scatter out and pick up what sign I'd

  left. I was too slow, too tired, and the going was too rough for me not to make

  mistakes.

  Suddenly, there was no place to go. There'd been no trail. I'd just been

  following the lines of least resistance, and now the mountainside broke sharply

  off and I stood on the brink of a cliff with a deep pool of water lying thirty

  feet below. I could hear water falling somewhere near, but the surface below was

  unruffled and clear. There was no hesitation in me.

  This far I had come, and there could be no thought of turning back. So I dropped

  my gear into the water, and feet first, I jumped.

  A moment of falling, then my body struck the water and knifed into it. There was

  intense cold. I went down, down, and then as I was coming up my head bumped

  something and it was the quiver of arrows I'd made. A few yards away was the

  bow. Gathering them up, I swam for the only shore there was, a narrow white-sand

  beach back under the overhang of the cliff from which I'd jumped.

  No more than four feet long and three wide, it was still a place where I could

  crawl up and rest. As I neared it I found my spear and the hide with my few

  belongings in it floating near. After I'd beached the bow and arrows, I

  recovered them and returned to the beach.

  Stretching out on that beach meant putting my feet in the water, and that was

  just what I did. That sandy strip was completely invisible from anyone not on

  the surface of the water, for the pool was rimmed around with smooth rock edges,

  and none of them seemed to be less than six feet above the water. Even if the

  Indians circled and got on the rocks opposite they could not see into my hiding

  place. Their eyes could touch only the water or the rock above me.