Ride The Desperate Trail

by Mike Kearby

  Free reined in Spirit, threw a glance to Parks and then tapped his spurs into Spirit’s flank. He knew the loud cries that filled the air indicated the dog had found something.

  A swarm of vultures darkened the sky as both men galloped to the base of the hill. Surprised by the scavengers, Free drew rein and gazed at the blackness. Clara! Fearing the worst, he slapped the reins hard across Spirit’s neck and urged the horse up the shifting mountain of sand.

  “Wait up, Free!” Parks shouted as the vultures circled above. “Don’t go over the hill!” he warned in desperation.

  “Com’on, Spirit!” Free gigged the Indian pony. “Git up, there!”

  Frantic to beat Free over the hill, Parks spurred Horse forward and urged the pony to cross the dune first. The men reached the top together and crested the hill only to find the Kiowa dog eating on the hind quarter of a dead horse. A vile smell simmered in the air, causing both to cover their mouths and noses.

  “Get away, Dog!” Free hollered as he rode close to the carcass. “Get outta there!”

  The dog, claiming the animal as his own, looked back to Free with wildness in his eyes and bared his teeth.

  “I wouldn’t try to interrupt, Free!” Parks shouted. “He still has a lot of Indian in him!”

  “What do you think this means?” Free asked as the dog flipped on his back and rolled in the carcass.

  Parks surveyed the desert surface. “I don’t know, but look at the tracks leading west. There were at least three horses riding in here.”

  Free leaned over Spirit’s left shoulder and studied the prints. “Let’s see where they take us.”

  The men walked the mustangs along the desert floor. The godforsaken landscape presented a zigzagged trail of boot prints and horse tracks that melted together until no sense of direction could be determined. A few hundred yards from the dead horse a speck of darkness caught Free’s eye. The unfocused blackness glistened brightly in the rippled air of the sand hills.

  “Look there.” Free pointed.

  “I see it.”

  The men nudged their ponies toward the object. An anxious feeling of fear crept once more through Free’s mind. He prayed that the darkness was simply a mirage, some kind of desert illusion and not his Clara. He had wished it so, just like his mother instructed. The tension strangled him and cut off his air, Please, he begged.

  Against the whiteness of the desert, a lifeless body lay sprawled in the sand.

  “Looks like Chase Hardy’s friend,” Parks said.

  Free gulped air and stared at the corpse. A single gunshot wound dotted the man’s forehead.

  “Being a friend of Hardy doesn’t seem to account for much,” Parks shrugged.

  “Why would Hardy shoot his accomplice?” Free asked.

  Parks rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t know. You’d figure Hardy would want all the help he could muster. He has to know that both of us are tailing him. So it might be that this fella ran with Clara.”

  “Why would he risk that, knowing Hardy’s reputation for being a hard case? He had to know Hardy would hunt him down and kill him.”

  “I don’t know the whys. But look at it. Hardy rides into the trader’s camp without Clara. Where would he have left her? This fella had to run off with her. Why else would Hardy take the desert route to the mountains?”

  Free looked ahead and stared into the distant horizon. “So they’re headed northwest?”

  “That would take them straight into the Guadalupes,” Parks said. He turned in his saddle to glance at the menacing sky behind them. “That wind is growing some teeth, Free. I don’t like the feel of it.” Parks sniffed the air. “Smells like rain and snow.”

  Free looked back, “More of that fuss, I suspect.” He swung a leg over Spirit and jumped to the soft sand. He stood over the dead man and said, “We best get him in the ground before winter blows in on us.”

  Parks nodded and continued to search the sky, “After that we better look for shelter, a snow storm after a hard ride will break down these mustangs so they’re unfit to run.”

  Free appraised the bleak desert surrounding them, “That might take considerable effort, Parks, cause all I see is sand and lots of it.”

  Chapter 21

  The Guadalupe Mountains, Christmas Day 1868

  At the approach to a mountain trail leading into the Guadalupes, Tig leaned from the saddle and snapped the branch of a live oak. Left to dangle in the wind, the limb would serve as a guidepost for anyone who followed the trio.

  “You think that’s wise, Tig?” McCaslin gazed at the broken branch as he rode past.

  “McCaslin, you are really beginning to rile me. Why don’t you let me worry about what’s wise and what’s not?” As Tig spoke, his gaze remained forward.

  “All I’m saying, Tig, is you’re not only leaving sign for the two following, but anyone one else in these mountains.”

  Tig reached up and snapped another limb as he rode by a line of trees. “I’ll snap every limb on this mountain if I so choose, McCaslin! I’ll also trample every blade of grass I see! I want those two cowboys coming straight up the trail to us!”

  At five thousand feet and with snow falling, Tig sighted the limestone walls of the old Pinery Station. The white rock sat in marked contrast to the green of the surrounding high mountain pines.

  The station offered a welcome invite to the road-weary trio. They rode through the lone entrance and pulled rein in the center of the enclosed pine stockade. Deserted for years, the old Pinery Station held favor with outlaws and renegades on the run from the law. The structure’s walls stood eleven feet high, and the station contained its own water source. It was the perfect hideout.

  “It ends here.” Tig jumped from his horse and stretched his back. “Fetch the woman, McCaslin, and get her tied up. I don’t need her running off now.”

  “Where’s she gonna run to, Tig? We’re five thousand feet into the mountains with wet snow falling. She’d die before she got a mile away.”

  Tig scowled at McCaslin’s defiance and bit hard on his lip. “McCaslin! We’re gonna need a fire to fight off this chill. I hope it’s not too much trouble to ask her to do that!” he bellowed.

  McCaslin dismounted and helped Clara from the horse.

  “Get out of this cold, Clara,” he said keeping a watchful eye on Hardy. “There’s a fireplace inside, and I stocked in wood weeks ago.”

  “Why, Mr. McCaslin?” Clara asked. “You don’t seem anything like him.”

  McCaslin gestured awkwardly toward the middle lean to. “Get inside before you catch the death, Clara. Take the bedroll with you.”

  “McCaslin!” Tig called. “We best get these horses in the corral and rubbed down.”

  McCaslin looked over to Tig and then glanced back to Clara, “I won’t let anything happen to you, that I promise, Clara.”

  Inside the small, darkened, doorless room, Clara found a pile of kindling and a can of matches in the fireplace. She nested the kindling, placed a handful of shredded pine bark in the center and then held a lit match to the wood. Minutes later, warmth and smoke filled the double-sided fireplace. She knew it was urgent to get herself warm. She knew the baby would feel whatever she felt, and if she got sick so would the baby. She had to stay alive. Alive and healthy.

  She removed the wet clothing that clung to her and hung them on a gun rack over the fireplace. Then she wrapped herself in the bedroll and began to rub her upper arms, trying to create much needed heat. “This is not how we were supposed to spend our first Christmas,” she whispered to her child.

  After a few minutes, the fire crackled and sparked as the dried pine logs were consumed in flames. Soon a spreading heat warmed her body and the room. She cradled her stomach and hummed softly, hoping the baby would recognize her voice.

  “Clara, are you OK?”

  Clara looked toward the doorway and saw McCaslin, “I’m fine, Mr. McCaslin.”

  “Who are you talking to?”

  “
It wasn’t talk, I was humming a gospel song to my baby.” Clara pulled the bedroll tighter around her shoulders.

  McCaslin swallowed hard. “You’re with child?”

  “I am, sir.” She returned her gaze to the flames dancing on the pine logs.

  McCaslin walked into the dimly lit room and removed his hat. “Whatever you do, Clara, don’t let Tig know that fact.”

  Clara turned her head and forced a tight smile. “What difference does it make, Mr. McCaslin? I’m sure he means to kill us all anyway.”

  “Don’t say that, Clara. I told you I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”

  “Well, ain’t this the sweetest thing.” Tig stood in the station door, “I wonder what it was those Apaches did to your brain, McCaslin? Cause you seem to be all mush right now.”

  McCaslin spun and faced Hardy. “Maybe so, Tig. But I’m telling you right now; no harm comes to Clara.”

  Tig growled. “I’ll tell you what, McCaslin. We’ll sort that out after her man and the cowboy are dead; ‘til then you make sure you’re up to the job ahead.”

  “Don’t worry about me, Tig, I’ll be up to it when the time presents itself.”

  Tig scratched his chin and stared at McCaslin, “I’m going out to pull the bars across the entrance gate. There’s still a day’s ration of beef in my saddle pack. You get that and the rest of the flour. I hate killing men on an empty stomach.”

  Chapter 22

  The Old Pinery Station, Texas December 1868

  The day after Christmas found the old Pinery Station covered in a light dusting of snow. Clara awoke to the charred smell of smoke as McCaslin and Hardy allowed the fire to burn out in the early morning hours.

  Feeling the room’s chill, she reached above the fireplace and removed her now dried clothing from the gun rack. She checked to make sure the men were still sleeping and then moved to a dark corner of the station room. With her back to the men, she wrapped the bedroll tightly around her body and put on her smoky, but fire-warmed woolen jeans and shirt.

  “Don’t worry about your privacy, Ma’m.”

  Clara swiveled at the voice.

  “I’m not worried, Mr. Hardy.”

  “I have no yearning for colored or Indian women,” Tig laughed.

  Clara turned and held her head high, “I don’t like you, Mr. Hardy. I’ve seen your kind all of my life. Men who hate for no other reason than the plea sure of it.”

  Tig clenched his jaw taut. “Watch your mouth, Ma’m, I’ll not be spoken to that way by a woman, especially a colored woman.”

  Clara glared in defiance. “I pray that someday you can find a peace within yourself, Mr. Hardy.”

  Tig kept an angry stare on Clara, “That peace will be coming soon, Ma’m, just as soon as your man arrives.”

  Clara stepped forward, “You might just find him more game than you wanted, Mr. Hardy. That is, if you don’t aim to shoot him in the back.”

  “Why you little—” Tig raised his hand above his head. “I ought to—”

  “What’s going on here?” McCaslin rose from his bedroll and looked at Clara.

  “Nothing, McCaslin.” Tig snarled, “Why don’t you get that fire breathing again and warm up this place?”

  Clara held her ground and kept her gaze on Hardy.

  “Clara?” McCaslin asked, “Everything OK?”

  “Everything is fine, Mr. McCaslin,” she looked to the fireplace.

  “Let me help you with the fire.”

  Tig turned and stood in the open doorway of the room. “Yeah, you help him with the fire,” he mocked.

  McCaslin moved to the fireplace and began to blow on the darkened wood. In a matter of seconds a ribbon of orange embers began to glow on the remaining logs. “Man, some bacon and biscuits would taste good this morning.” He rubbed his hands back and forth feeling the slow rising heat of the fire. “What do you think, Tig?” He looked toward the doorway.

  Tig turned slowly toward the room and rubbed his tongue along his bottom lip.

  McCaslin stared at the big man and wondered why he carried such a strange look on his face. “What is it, Tig? You look like you’ve set eyes on a ghost.”

  Tig staggered several steps into the room with both hands clutching his chest.

  “Christ!” McCaslin yelled. Three arrows, all tipped with red hawk feathers, protruded from Tig’s chest. “Clara! Get against the back wall!” he screamed. “Apaches!”

  Tig fell forward with a loud smack on the dirt floor. His back held three more arrows.

  McCaslin straightened and grabbed for the Winchester leaning against the fireplace. He quickly chambered a shell and moved to the right edge of the doorway. “Clara! Are you OK?” he called out.

  “I’m fine!” Clara shouted back. “Do you see anything?” She scurried over and knelt behind McCaslin’s back.

  “Nothing,” he whispered. “I warned him. He left sign all over the mountain.” He grimaced at Hardy’s lifeless body and then directed his attention to the gated entrance. “I sure wish we had a door. The station walls will protect us, but if those braves decide to rush all at once we’ll both be up the flume.”

  A flash of color caught McCaslin’s eye. Two braves crept forward in an attempt to remove the bars from the entrance gate. With the bars down, the band could easily ride into the stockade and rush the station room. McCaslin pulled the Winchester to his shoulder and sent two rounds into the nearest warrior. A spray of red colored the snow below the gate as the remaining Apache disappeared behind the pine stockade.

  “I got one of them, but we’re in for a bit of difficulty, Clara. I only have six rounds of ammunition on my belt and only three shells left in the rifle.”

  Clara looked over McCaslin’s shoulder toward the entrance of the station. “What do we do?”

  McCaslin turned to face her, “I don’t know, but I need to get you away from here.”

  “What?” Clara questioned. “Where would I go?”

  McCaslin swallowed hard. “Clara, there’s something I wasn’t straight with you or Tig about.” He stared at Tig’s body. “When we rode out with the Lowery brothers that day, Clem Lowery found an Apache squaw giving birth.” He looked into Clara’s eyes and shook his head. “You gotta believe me when I tell you the rest of us didn’t have anything to do with it.”

  “With what, Mr. McCaslin? What happened?” Clara asked.

  “Clem grabbed the squaw’s baby and smashed its head on a rock.” McCaslin leaned his head into the Winchester. “They raped the mother and then killed her.” He sobbed. “That’s why the Apaches chased us. They won’t rest until all of us are dead. They want me, Clara! That’s why you have to get out of here!” McCaslin stood and pulled Clara to her feet. “I owe you my life, and now I’m going to repay that. There’s a small opening in the corral. You can sneak out the back way and ride east. If you go a mile or so from here, you’ll pick up the old Mexican trail down the mountain. But you have to go now, Clara! Before they rush this place!”

  “How can we risk moving to the corral?” Clara asked. “Listen to what you’re saying.”

  McCaslin pointed to the fireplace. “I’ll pull the wood out and you crawl through to the other side.”

  In the adjoining room, the doorway faced west and offered Clara full protection from the Apaches. As she crawled through the fireplace, a small piece of burnt wood caught her attention.

  “Stay close to the wall, Clara,” McCaslin hollered from the main room.

  “When you reach the corral, don’t waste time trying to saddle the horses, throw a blanket on one and lead the other on a stringer.”

  Clara looked back through the fireplace and stared incredulously at McCaslin,

  “That leaves you afoot.”

  “When you get a hundred yards or so away from the station, cut the one horse loose and let him run. It might throw the Apaches off your trail! If you can make it ‘til nightfall, you should be safe. The Apache don’t like to fight or trail after dark!”
r />   “Mr. McCaslin!” Clara shouted, “How are you going to get out of here?”

  “Ride and don’t stop, Clara. No matter what you hear or how safe you think it is, keep riding. Ride until you find people.”

  “I can’t just leave you, Mr. McCaslin.” A solitary tear ran from Clara’s eye.

  “Go now!” McCaslin said wide eyed. “Go now, Clara! Save your baby before it’s too late!”

  Chapter 22

  The Guadalupe Mountains, Texas December 1868

  After a punishing night of freezing temperatures and snow at the Apache Seep, Free and Parks rose in the early morning hours and rode the hundred miles to the Ojo Aridó trail located two thousand feet below the Old Pinery Station. The Kiowa dog appeared every now and then, running ahead of the horses in the prairie grass with his nose pushed low to the ground.

  The two fatigued men began the grueling climb up the balance of the trailhead late in the afternoon. The temperature was well above freezing, but with a cloudless night looming, the prospect of another miserable evening stirred in both men’s minds.

  At one thousand feet up Free noticed a trail no wider than a man’s boot cutting into the Ojo Aridó. “Look at this, Parks.” He motioned toward the ground.

  “Appears to be moccasin tracks,” Parks said, surveying the trail. “I’d say a band of fifteen or more cut across here and headed up the mountain.” He stared up toward the station.

  “Kiowa?” Free asked.

  “I reckon them to be Apache.” Parks opened the tobacco pouch hanging from his neck and removed a plug. “But I can’t figure why they would be this far to the east during winter.”

  Free lifted the tobacco pouch from inside his shirt and opened the neck. The leather pouch carried his thoughts back to the morning when Clara presented the gift to him. What seemed like a lifetime ago had in reality happened only seven days earlier. He smiled as he remembered that morning in the kitchen with his mother. He cast a blank gaze up the trail and became lost in his thoughts. He wondered if he would find Clara waiting for him at the station. He wondered if he would be able to hold her again. And he wondered if he would have the opportunity to kill Tig Hardy. For as sure as he breathed, he knew an ambush awaited them.