Showdown

by Deborah Chester

  Noel glared at him. After his big production of keeping the facts about the Indian quiet, here Skeet was, shooting off his mouth. It didn’t figure.

  Don Emilio’s eyes went again to each of their faces. “What Apache?”

  Cody frowned, his face mirroring the exasperation Noel felt. He said, “One Comanchero got her. The rest are locked up in our saddle house. We tracked them this far, but it looks like they got bushwhacked by a ’pache.”

  Don Emilio looked very grave. The gloved hand holding his reins tightened into a fist. “Some renegade Chiricahuas are said to be heading our way from Sonora, but I do not think they have come this far east. The Mescaleros have been stealing my cattle all spring. It could be a warrior from Tonithian’s clan, or it could be Kansana.”

  Abruptly he turned in the saddle and addressed his vaqueros in rapid Spanish. Noel’s LOC, acting as a translator, supplied meaning to his words. “…the mountains and bring El Raton to the hacienda. Pedro, ride straight to Palomas and take the doctor to the Double T. The rest of you, go there now and assist the old man. Obey his orders as you would mine.”

  Two thirds of the riders galloped off toward the mountains. The rest started northeast, toward the ranch.

  Don Emilio smiled at Cody. “Let us investigate this matter of an Indian who dares too much. I am at your disposal, senors.”

  Cody smiled. “That’s real neighborly—”

  “We don’t need your help,” said Skeet.

  The warmth chilled slightly in Don Emilio’s eyes. “I think you do,” he said pleasantly. “None of you speaks Apache. Do you expect to bargain for her in bits of broken Spanish and English? Let us go, amigos.”

  “Not so fast!” said Skeet. “Where’re you sending those men?”

  “To help Trask,” said Noel before Don Emilio could answer.

  The grandee’s hazel eyes reappraised him. “You speak Spanish, senor?”

  “Yes. But why didn’t you keep some of your men with us? The more we have, the better we can—”

  “No,” said Don Emilio firmly, “that is untrue. You do not understand the hatred between Apaches and Mexicans, I think. The senorita will be safer if four brave men ask for her return.”

  Skeet snorted. “He means a Mex army would get her killed sure.”

  “Or start a little war,” said Don Emilio.

  “I see,” said Noel. “Well, thanks for sending the doctor. The old man will be grateful.”

  Cody’s blue eyes widened. “You’re sending a doctor to help Uncle Frank?”

  Don Emilio shrugged. “It is the least I can do, no? If his wound is truly serious, perhaps help will come too late. But I know your grandfather well enough to think he has not sent for the gringo physician in Deming.”

  “No,” said Cody. “It’s too far, and we couldn’t spare the rider.”

  “My man is closer. And now, for your sister—”

  “We’ll find her without your help,” said Skeet. “The only folks who hate Mexicans more than I do are Indians. You go riding into their camp, and they’ll kill her sure.”

  Don Emilio’s expression grew still and cold. “You are mistaken, my friend. I am known by these bands. We have talked many times.”

  “So you’re friends?” Skeet spat tobacco scornfully. “Just like you’re friends with those Comancheros. My, ain’t you bein’ helpful all of a sudden. And here I figured you were payin’ El Raton and his boys to steal our cattle and burn our ranch. Mr. Trask sittin’ home couldn’t put up much fight if your vaqueros are aimin’ to finish off the job.”

  “Skeet!” said Cody in anger. “Shut up—”

  “The hell I will,” said Skeet. “He ain’t no—”

  Noel’s fist connected with Skeet’s jaw with a thud that jolted his hand to the wrist and sent the cowboy sprawling to the ground. By the time Skeet scrambled furiously to his feet, spurs jingling and dust fogging around him, Noel had dismounted.

  Skeet’s hand went for his gun, but Noel stepped in close with a quick one-two punch that snapped back Skeet’s head and sent him reeling against his horse. The animal shifted away, snorting. Regaining his balance, Skeet turned around. He’d lost his hat. Blood trickled from the comer of his mouth, and his eyes were flat and mean.

  Noel swung again, but this time Skeet dodged the blow and delivered a roundhouse punch that made stars explode across Noel’s vision. He shook his head to clear it and ducked another swing, coming up under Skeet’s arm and using the man’s own impetus to throw him down.

  Skeet lay there on his back, winded and stunned. When he got up a second time, he did so slowly. He dabbed at the blood on his mouth, but he made no attempt to continue the fight.

  Breathing heavily, Noel said, “I don’t understand why you say one thing and do another, but from where I come from, that’s suspicious. Why don’t you stop causing trouble and let us get on with finding the girl?”

  Noel turned to pick up his horse’s reins. From the comer of his eye he saw Skeet reach for his gun.

  Noel whirled to face him, his heart hammering fast, but a sharp click came from behind him and Don Emilio said, “I do not think you should draw, amigo. If you do, I will have to shoot you in the hand. Sometimes my aim is not so good, and I hit people in the chest or the stomach or that place in the thigh where the artery pumps mucho blood. Why don’t you be very still and save us trouble?”

  Red-faced, Skeet dropped his hand away from the butt of his pistol.

  “Get on your horse and ride!” said Cody. His voice cracked on him, and that seemed to make him even angrier. “Right now! Get on back to the ranch and help Grandpa!”

  Skeet stared at him in consternation. “You ain’t goin’ off with these two?”

  “Yes, I am, and the sooner you get out of our way the sooner we can catch up with Lisa-Marie.”

  “Now, boy,” said Skeet sharply. “You think about what you’re doing. Navarres is trying his best to take the Double T away from your grandpa, and this here stranger is likely helping him.”

  “Not likely,” said Noel quietly.

  “Cody!” said Skeet. “We’re pals, boy. You can’t side with them against me.”

  Cody’s face twisted with indecision. “You’re making this awful hard. It ain’t one side against the other. They’re the only help we’ve got, and right now we need them.”

  “Thought you and me were saddle pals,” said Skeet.

  “You’re playing head games with the boy,” said Noel. “Stop it.”

  “Are you gonna ride on back to the ranch like I said?” asked Cody. “Or—”

  “I take my orders from Mr. Trask,” said Skeet in a low, tight voice. “He said to bring his girl home. I aim to do it.”

  “Not with us, I think,” said Don Emilio.

  Noel was still standing by his horse’s head. He took a quick step toward Skeet, who backed up involuntarily, then caught himself with a scowl.

  “You think you’ve whipped me, tenderfoot, but you ain’t,” he said.

  “Ride,” said Noel.

  “I’m the best tracker this side of El Paso,” said Skeet.

  Cody hesitated. His eyes sought first Don Emilio’s, then Noel’s.

  Noel said, “I can find her.”

  Skeet laughed harshly. “You? How?”

  “I can find Leon,” said Noel, not intending to explain how he could set the directional locator on his LOC and go straight to Leon. “As long as she’s with him—”

  “That’s crazy!”

  “No, it’s not,” said Cody eagerly. “They’re twins, same as me and Lisa-Marie are twins. When we were little, sometimes I could tell what she was going to say before she said it. She was better at figuring me out than I was her. I got lost once while we were playing in Silver Canyon, and she found me. I’ll bet Noel can find his brother.”

  Without another word Skeet picked up his greasy hat and crammed it on his head. He swung aboard his horse. “If she turns up dead, with her scalp hanging on the lodge pole, don’t blame
me.”

  No one answered him, and he lashed his horse on the flank, riding away at a furious gallop.

  Noel watched him go for a couple of seconds, then turned his head and caught Don Emilio staring at him intently.

  The Mexican smiled, but it never reached his intelligent hazel eyes.

  Noel didn’t smile back. He climbed onto his horse and tapped Cody on the shoulder.

  The boy was looking worried, but he managed a lopsided grin for Noel. “I guess we shouldn’t have run him off. He is the best tracker around. Uncle Frank will sure be mad at me if Skeet quits the Double T.” Cody’s voice broke. For a moment his toughness vanished and he was just a scared, upset kid.

  He gulped a little, and Noel put his hand on the boy’s shoulder in silent reassurance. “You made the right decision,” he said.

  “I hope so,” said Cody. He looked at Don Emilio, who was watching them like a cat at a mousehole. “What he said was true. You and Grandpa ain’t exactly friends.”

  “Neither are we enemies,” said Don Emilio smoothly. “While we talk the day grows longer. Shall we ride?”

  He cast about until he picked up the trail left by the Apache and his two captives. “He is heading toward those hills. Kansana is camped there,” said Don Emilio.

  Cody turned pale. “We’ve got to hurry! We’ve got to get her back before—”

  Noel gripped the boy’s arm. “Easy. Hysterics won’t help.”

  “He is not many hours ahead of us, this brave,” said Don Emilio, spurring his horse forward. The stallion reared and tried to leap into a gallop. Don Emilio controlled him, reining him to a fast, ground-eating trot. “He must go slowly, because they are walking behind his horse. We can catch up before they reach Kansana’s camp.”

  “I thought you said you were on good terms with Kansana,” said Noel. He didn’t like the fear in Cody’s eyes. It was the naked, desperate kind, the ratlike, scrambling kind. The boy wasn’t thinking; he was just reacting. That was dangerous. “Don Emilio? Didn’t you say—”

  “Si, I know him,” said Don Emilio impatiently. “Good friends? No. That is not possible with the Apache.”

  “Kansana doesn’t keep white captives,” muttered Cody. His hands were tight on the reins, and his horse was tossing its head as though picking up the emotions in its rider.

  “I don’t understand,” said Noel. “Why take them in, if—”

  “It is a very great coup,” said Don Emilio with a flash of white teeth, although he did not look amused. “The Comanchero will die. The girl…probably they will trade her to another band. But,” he added with emphasis, glancing at Cody who looked like he might throw up at any moment, “this will not be her fate. We are going to rescue her first, amigos.”

  In the powdery dirt the trail was easy to follow. Even Noel could make out the hoofprint with the nicked shoe. Two parallel sets of footprints were spaced on either side of the hoofprints, indicating that Leon and Lisa-Marie were walking side by side. The girl’s tracks showed small square heels and very pointed toes. Noel tried to envision female footgear of the late Victorian period. His mental memory banks conjured up a vague idea of high-topped button shoes, very narrow and high-heeled. If Lisa-Marie were walking in shoes like that, her feet would soon be in agony.

  As for Leon, he should have been able to pull one of his mental hypnosis tricks on the Indian by now. He must be injured, but if he was hurt badly he wouldn’t be able to walk far.

  Now and then the tracks were blurred, betraying where one or both of the captives had stumbled. Don Emilio reined to a halt and pointed at a wide drag mark.

  “The man fell, and was dragged through the mesquite. Ah, si, I am right. Here is part of his shirt and some of his trousers.” The scraps of fabric caught on long, wicked thorns fluttered in the dry, hot wind blowing from the west.

  Past the mesquite thicket, Leon’s tracks reappeared, indicating that he had regained his feet. Now and then the footprints wavered. Leon was dragging one foot. Lisa-Marie stumbled often.

  Overhead, the sun blazed like a furnace. The wind gave no relief. Noel’s mouth felt so dry he couldn’t work up enough spit to swallow. He took small, careful sips of the tepid water from his canteen, making the precious liquid last. What sufferings of thirst the captives must be going through, he didn’t want to consider.

  Don Emilio reined up again. “He has pulled off the shoes.”

  “Aw, damn!” said Cody, wiping his face with his arm. “Now we’re really gonna be—”

  “Who pulled off his shoes?” asked Noel, coming up last. “Leon?”

  Only then did he see the four iron horseshoes lying scattered on the ground. He felt like a fool for having asked such an ignorant question, and his face heated up beneath the scorn in Cody’s eyes.

  Don Emilio’s lips quirked slightly, but he said nothing.

  The soft ground grew harder and stonier. Patches of tall, tan grass rippled in the wind and yucca plants stood loaded with snowy blooms. Pack rats, plump and anxious, scurried across their trail to vanish into dens dug beneath bushes with long, dull green needles.

  Maintaining his place at the rear, Noel gradually fell farther and farther back. Bringing his wrist surreptitiously to his mouth, he whispered in the directions for a locator sweep. It didn’t take a genius to figure that as soon as they reached the rocky foothills, they were going to lose the trail. Already Don Emilio had slowed their pace. His dark head swiveled constantly as he rode. His gaze swept the ground, pausing where the tracks vanished, only to find them again a few feet onward.

  “LOC, confirm locator command,” whispered Noel.

  “Confirm,” replied the LOC.

  Cody glanced back at him and waved.

  Noel rubbed his jaw with his wrist and lowered his arm, feeling his heart going absurdly fast.

  Cody waved again, signaling for him to catch up. Noel kicked his horse, and it broke into a lope until it reached Cody’s mount.

  “You gotta stay with us,” said Cody.

  Noel glanced back the way they’d come and saw a faint speck through the heat waves shimmering on the horizon. A faint speck throwing up dust.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  Cody frowned, flushing bright red. He glanced back quickly and shrugged. “I don’t see nothing.”

  “Sure you do, eagle-eye,” said Noel. “Is Skeet following us?”

  Cody shrugged again. “It could be someone out looking for his lost cow.”

  Don Emilio wheeled his horse around to face them. Dust had powdered his face and clothing. “What is that so charming expression of you Americano cowpunchers? If a frog could fly, he would not bump his tail every time he jumped? We are not on your grandfather’s land, Cody. I do not think he runs his cattle this far. My men are branding south of the hacienda today. I think we must say that it is Skeet.”

  Cody turned even redder. “He’s crazy.”

  “He’s trouble,” said Noel.

  Don Emilio sighed. “I think he may be useful. I have lost the trail.”

  Chapter 6

  A full moon floated in the sky, casting down light strong enough to read by. Noel’s shadow extended ahead of him as he slipped away from the sleeping camp nestled in the curve of a shallow canyon.

  The air was cold and still, hushed like a pent breath. Around Noel rose sky and mountain, bigger than life, dwarfing him to an insignificant speck, all in varying shades of black and gray like a washed pen and ink drawing. He smelled dust on the crisp, clean air and the acrid scent of weeds crushed beneath his boot soles as he walked.

  The climb was steep enough to make him puff by the time he reached the top of the canyon. He paused to catch his breath and stared down at his companions rolled in their saddle blankets around a dead campfire. The scent of wood ash spiraled up now and then, ghostly faint.

  Noel had first watch. He figured sentry duty could take a rest for a while. A consultation with his LOC was long overdue, but this was the first privacy he’d had all day.


  In the distance an owl hooted. Nervous prickles ran up the back of his neck. He shoved his fingers through his hair and activated the LOC.

  The shape of the turquoise and silver cuff changed from a primitive artifact to a sophisticated technological wonder. A dim shimmer of light from its pulsing circuitry shone through the clear sides of the bracelet. Biochips of microscopic size, miniaturized circuits, and fiber optics—all the miracles of twenty-sixth-century technology—were useless junk as long as the damage went unrepaired.

  He sighed. If he could reach the twenty-first century, even the twentieth, the necessary tools would be available to him.

  But in this time, telegraph wire was about the most sophisticated form of communication in existence. If he caught a stagecoach or train back East, he might find a telephone, but it would be too crude to help him jury-rig repairs.

  “LOC, run diagnostic codes,” he said.

  “Running.”

  “Locate malfunction.”

  The LOC pulsed steadily.

  “Well?” said Noel impatiently. “Have you located it?”

  “Affirmative.”

  “And it is?”

  “Closed time loop. Recall canceled. Communication sending canceled. Emergency recall canceled. Destination codes…destination codes…destination codes—”

  “Stop!” he said, afraid the computer might burn itself out. “Well, I guess I’d already guessed as much, but it’s so nice to have it verbally confirmed.”

  “Is that a question?” asked the LOC.

  “No.”

  He rubbed his eyes, which were gritty from lack of sleep. His face and hands hurt from sunburn. His rump ached from hours in the saddle. His knees felt permanently bowed. His mouth was so dry, he wondered if he would ever find enough water to drink again. He stank of dried sweat and dust. Beard stubble made his jaw itch.

  He scratched, trying not to give way to irritation and fear. He’d spent most of his visit to medieval Greece battling those two emotions, reacting in panic, and hauling himself out of crisis after crisis. But now, he was beginning to accept the fact that he couldn’t get back. Not accept it as in give up hope, but accept it to the point that he could try to adapt.