Dust Devil

by Bonds, Parris Afton

  Scrappers. That was what the Irish called men like Stephen and Grant. They loved a challenge, a good fight. Too bad, and Rosemary braked her thoughts. Dear God, was it wrong to want someone as malignant as Stephen to die? But who was she to judge? She, an adulteress.

  But I don’t like leaving Cambria unprotected,” Stephen was saying. "Perhaps I should leave Lario in charge.”

  "No!” Lario’s presence was equally tormenting but in a different way. For the sight of him never failed to remind her that only he could slake the passion in her that his presence ignited. And this shameful knowledge made her hate both herself and Lario.

  She caught Stephen’s stare of surprise and hastily wiped Jamie’s food-covered mouth, masking her vehemence. With his enormous ego and pride in his pure Anglo blood, Stephen would probably never conceive of the idea that she could give herself to an Indian. Nevertheless, he was a shrewd man.

  "You’ll need all the help you can get,” she said with feigned concern. "You’ve told me yourself that Lario knows this country better than anyone. Cambria will be all right. Just make certain the Rebels do not get this far.”

  She played the dutiful wife and stood on the veranda to wave good-bye as her husband rode away with Lario and almost a hundred of Cambria’s men. But it was Lario who held her gaze. Even at a distance, she could separate him from the rest of the men. The red bandana about his head, the carbine sheathed at his saddle holster, the easy way he sat on the Arab horse.

  With Stephen and Lario went all her tension. She could relax her guard. Her shameful secret was safe, she thought.

  CHAPTER 14

  A column of smoke penciled the western sky, and Rosemary frowned. It was hardly likely to be a forest fire. It was too far up in the mountains, above the timberline. But the cabin Stephen had leased to the old prospector was in that vicinity. Her lips tightened. The Rebels—or the Apaches?

  She turned her gaze to the southwest. A dark line on the horizon loomed larger with each passing minute. Stephen had ridden out five days earlier, but she doubted the band of riders that she could not yet distinguish would be coming from that direction. She spun and went inside. From the gun cabinet in Stephen’s trophy room she took the Springfield. She had no idea how to use it. But whoever was riding toward the Castle did not know that.

  "Mrs. Rhodes!” a voice called out from the veranda. It belonged to Cody Strahan, a boy of no more than sixteen years who had drifted up from near the Texas border when Sibley and his Confederate Rebels had burned out his ranch.

  Partly out of pity, partly out of need with all the men gone who were capable of toting a rifle, she had hired the kid. Cody was mostly legs, the long limber kind that looked like they would buckle at the knees like a jack-in-the-box when he walked. He seemed a pleasant, polite young man until one looked into the eyes . . . there was something that said he no longer belonged to a civilized world.

  Still, she sensed he was a cool and trustworthy young man, the only one she could depend on at the moment, though he was just a boy; almost her age she reminded herself. But she felt eons older.

  She shut the door of the gun cabinet, grabbed up a heavy woolen rebozo, and hurried back out onto the veranda. The house servants trailed out onto the veranda behind her.

  The peach fuzz on Cody’s face glistened with perspiration despite the brisk winter wind. "Indians,” he whispered as the horsemen in blankets and buckskins rode into the suddenly vacant village below. "’Pears to be Apaches, ma’am.”

  "Es Chief Perro Amarillo,” Consuela grunted.

  "So soon?” Just that summer Stephen had told her that Lario had given Yellow Dog four ewes and a ram from the best of the Rambouillet herd, which, she thought bitterly, the chiefs band had no doubt eaten.

  She passed the Springfield to Cody. "Wait here.” As she descended the veranda steps the wind whipped her skirts about her. She stopped at the edge of the well-trimmed grounds while the bulky figure on horseback rode out ahead of the other Apaches.

  "Cuidado, Senora!” Consuela called from the veranda. "Do not trust him. Es un selvaje!”

  It was the first time Rosemary had seen Perro Amarillo, and he did look like a savage, dressed as he was in a dirty blanket and a black silk top hat. When he was within yards of her he halted. Sitting before him on the mustang was a small child, a boy of perhaps three.

  Yellow Dog’s face wore a dull, bestial expression. "Your man — where is he?”

  Behind her Rosemary heard the crunch of boots as Cody came to her side. "He will be back soon,” she answered. Would they attack the Castle? She counted nearly twenty of them, armed with tasseled lances and sinew-backed bows. But she was reassured by the presence of Yellow Dog’s son. Surely they would not attack with the boy there. "What is it you wish?”

  "Guns. Knives. It is cold. We must kill more buffalo.”

  "I have only the guns for our people, Yellow Dog.” She forced her voice to remain calm, to speak slowly. "But we have sacks of flour in the gristmill I would like to give your people.”

  Yellow Dog shook his head, and his braids flopped on his shoulders. "No.”

  She inclined her head toward Cody’s, whispering something, and he turned on his heel and disappeared inside the Castle.

  "You have tiswin for Yellow Dog?”

  "No, I have no tiswin.” The last thing she needed was for the band to become drunk on corn whiskey. "But I do have this for you, Yellow Dog,” and she took the white buffalo rug Cody returned with and walked forward with it stretched out over her arms for all the Apaches to see its beauty. Stephen had told her a down-and-out mountain man had traded the rare fur for a Winchester.

  Her hair tingled at the nape of her neck as she drew close to Yellow Dog and his men. They could kill her easily. The terrible vision of her brother’s tiny body being tossed from lance to lance flashed before her eyes, and she felt the old fear crash over her like a tidal wave. Still, she moved until she stood next to the mustang, close enough to see the face of the chiefs son, and she shuddered. It was as opaque and unreadable as his father’s. The stone-brown eyes looked right through her. She passed the rug up to Yellow Dog. "As a gift of our friendship.”

  The Indian’s dirt-grooved hands held the snow-white rug for a long moment. Then he nodded. He reined his pony in sharply and turned away with the band falling in behind him.

  Rosemary let out a sigh of relief. But when she reached the veranda, she found she was trembling, her legs weak. She leaned her forehead against the veranda’s cedar post for support. The rough bark scratched her head. Now perspiration dotted her upper lip, and the chill wind turned the droplets to frost.

  "Senora,” Consuela said, "it is better that you lay down, no?”

  "Here, let me give you a hand, ma’am,” Cody said.

  She shook her head. "No, I’ll be all right. Keep an eye on Yellow Dog.” However, she accepted Consuela’s stout arm and let the old woman lead her indoors out of the cold.

  "I’ll be fine,” she murmured again as she went to stand before the fire that roared in the marbled fireplace. She stretched out her hands to clutch the mantel. "Just give me a few moments. Yellow Dog frightened me more than I realized.”

  Consuela looked at the slim body and taut face with its angular contours and frowned. "It is not Yellow Dog, Senora, that makes you so.”

  She turned from the fire’s warm blaze when she heard the certainty in Consuela’s voice. "What?” she asked, puzzled.

  "You no can tell, Senora? You are embarazada.”

  She took a step backward. "’Tis impossible! I couldn’t be pregnant! I haven’t . . .”

  Why had she not been aware of her body’s changes? She had been pregnant before. Twice. Enough to realize this time. But before, she had been eagerly awaiting the indications that she was with child, and this time . . .

  Her gaze went back to Consuela’s face. And she knew that Consuela was also aware of the truth.

  Sweet Jesus, Stephen would tolerate a lot for the sake of Cambria. But n
ot a child that was not his.

  * * * * *

  Stephen leaned his head against the back of the chair and closed his eyes. Rosemary and Consuela exchanged looks. The cook nodded her head once in affirmation before trudging into the kitchen.

  "I’m worn out,” he mumbled. "Three days it took us, but we drove those bloody bastards out of Santa Fe and all the way back down Mesilla Valley.”

  "And Grant?” she asked softly. "Is he all right?” She wore an off-the-shoulder dress of midnight blue satin and had her hair dressed in ringlets rather than the usual chignon. What lay before her was a distasteful, repugnant act. But it had to be done. She would not be driven from Cambria. She would not give up her home.

  Stephen opened his eyes and raised the glass to his lips, swilling the whiskey quickly. "Grant carried the day at Peralta. It will earn him his major’s rank for certain.”

  She wanted to ask about Lario for she had not seen him ride into the village with the other men, but she was afraid of arousing Stephen’s suspicion. He saved her from her agony, saying, "Lario was no less daring. The damned Indian took chances the troopers would not. As if he did not care for his safety. Hell, I can’t afford to lose a caporal as good as he.” The last came out on Stephen’s tongue with a slur, and he set the liquor from him.

  She felt ill with the realization that Lario could have been killed. She wondered if he was now in the village below with some flashing, dark-eyed maiden or had returned to his pueblo and Adala. By an effort of will she forced herself to rise and walk around the table to stand behind Stephen. She put her hands on his shoulders. "Come to bed, Stephen. You’re tired.”

  He squinted up at her and shook his head, trying to shake away the alcohol’s fumes that clouded his mind. Something that might have been suspicion furrowed deeper the crease between his brows. Then he laughed aloud. "Come’n Rosie,” he said and grabbed her about the waist for support to pull himself up out of the chair. “Funny, how liquor can get to you when you are this dead tired. Don’t know when I’ve had been this drunk.”

  She shut her eyes and forced her rigid limbs to relax as he fumbled at the buttons of his pants. She heard his erratic footsteps as he stumbled in the dark looking for her bed and felt the give of the feather mattress when his hands searched for her body. "Here,” she whispered, for once instructing him.

  "Ridin’ you not so bad, Rosie.” His breath quickened, and he increased the tempo of his movements so that within moments he fell limply across her, panting. "Not so bad,” he mumbled. "Not so bad.”

  When his staccato snorts of sleep reached through to her self-induced trance, she cautiously slid from beneath the heavy weight of his right side. His sour breath assailed her, and she turned her face away and closed her eyes . . . only to find the black eyes of another face painted on the canvas of her mind.

  * * * * *

  Grant stood much too close, the passion of his face exposed to anyone who looked for it. Rosemary cast a surreptitious glance at Libby, but the young wife, ballooning in the first months of her own pregnancy, seemed not to notice. She sat on one of the benches that lined Fort Sumner’s mess hall, which was now cleared of its long tables, and talked desultorily with the wife of Lieutenant Colonel Kit Carson, Josepha of the rich Jaramillo family.

  "You’re not listening to what I’m saying, Rosemary,” Grant whispered at her ear.

  "What?” she asked distractedly. Her foot tapped with the fiddler’s rapid rendition of the "Pigeon Wing.” She longed to join the reel in progress, but the idea of a pregnant woman dancing was scandalous. She did not know why she even bothered to make the full day’s trip for the fort’s valentine party; and yet that was not entirely true.

  During the day’s journey she had been able to catch glimpses of Lario when he returned to the buckboard to discuss with Stephen the terrain ahead or the next halt for water and rest. Hungrily her eyes devoured his lean frame and caressed the sinewy muscles of his shoulders. If Lario had not made the journey at Colonel Carson’s request, she doubted if she would have gone.

  "I said,” Grant repeated with some exasperation, "that if I did not know better, I would accuse you of having a lover.” Rosemary’s gaze flew upward to Grant’s handsome face. Was he only joking? "I do,” she said lightly. "My husband. We’re expecting a child also, Grant.” Indelicate to tell a man of such a condition but necessary at this point, Rosemary told herself. "In about five months.”

  In about four months to be more exact, she thought. Thank goodness she was tall and carried the baby low. She was still small, though the tightly laced stays were cutting into her ribs.

  Grant covered his surprise, saying, "That explains the sparkle in your eyes. You’re positively radiant.”

  She wanted to change the dangerous subject. "That little man who just walked outside with Lario and Stephen— is he the famous Kit Carson?”

  A smile twitched Grant’s mustache at her obvious ploy. "The same. With the withdrawal of the Union troops back to the battlefronts in the East, the Indian attacks have increased. Carson’s been ordered by General Carleton to take the New Mexico Volunteers and put a halt to these attacks.”

  She shivered, remembering the old prospector that Lario had brought in the week after Yellow Dog’s visit. The old man dangled over the back of Lario’s Arab, his mangled head already covered with maggots.

  "Come along,” Grant said, his hand taking her arm possessively. "I’ll introduce you.”

  The three men stood in the center of the fort’s parade grounds. Stephen was pointing out the new barracks, the hospital, and the ice house. "I have been explaining to Colonel Carson,” Stephen said when she and Grant joined them, "that the fort will make an excellent reservation post. I’ve arranged with the Secretary of the Interior to lease our land that surrounds the fort to the government.”

  So Stephen was turning another penny, Rosemary thought sourly. She looked at Lario who hunkered on one knee, calmly smoking. The cigarette’s flare lit his inscrutable face. "What reservation are you talking about?” she asked, making a halfhearted attempt to be sociable.

  "You must realize, Mrs. Rhodes,” Kit Carson said, and she found it odd that this fearless man had such a high-pitched voice, "that the War Department’s withdrawal of troops from the Territory is, from the Apache and Navajo point of view, a victory. They reason that the white soldiers have given up and retreated to their own country. No white man will be safe until every Apache and Navajo Indian is patrolled on the reservation. Captain Raffin here will be in charge of the reservation, ma’am.”

  Rosemary looked around her, recalling the barren, flat land that stretched outside the fort and finding it difficult to believe the government wanted people to live there. Her gaze halted on Grant. Another feather for his cap, she thought, but the mention of Lario’s name drew her eyes back to his dark face. She wished she could read his thoughts or that he would say something, but he only waited patiently as Kit Carson continued.

  "I’ve been hoping to persuade Lario Santiago to convince his Navajo people there are advantages to living here on the Bosque Redondo Reservation. Raffin has here a clinic, and the fort’ll soon have a doctor. The Bureau of Indian Affairs is having built a trader’s post just outside the fort to distribute to the Indians beef and flour, and they will be taught to farm.” Kit squatted down now to face Lario. The old scout’s keen eyes in the seamed face glowed intently. "Your people must understand that warfare will solve nothing.”

  Lario’s voice was soft but firm. "Naat’aani,” he said, using the Navajo form of address for headman, "my people, the Dine’e, and the Apache, they are not farmers, Naat’aani. They are shepherds and herdsmen. They would not like being tied down like a hobbled horse. They would die. But I will talk with the Navajo Naat’aani—Manuelito.”

  "Tell your chiefs also,” Grant said, the dislike he had for Lario showing in his eyes, "that if they do not come peacefully, every man, woman, and child found off the reservation will be shot. All your pueblos’ food suppli
es will be destroyed—as will your race. These are orders from General Carleton.”

  Lario rose. His black eyes rested only a fraction of a second on Rosemary before his burning gaze went to meet that of Grant’s. "Maybe much blood will flow before you are finished.”

  "I hope you can help to avoid that,” Kit said.

  In the moonlight the scout’s silvery hair was as light as Lario’s was dark. But the blue eyes of the scout and the black eyes of the Indian were both filled with unfathomable sadness.

  CHAPTER 15

  Rosemary looked down at the fuzzy red head of hair that nuzzled at her breast, tugging so hard that the nipple hurt with the flow of milk. A great love for the child coursed through her. The baby was a tenacious thing. Weighing less than five pounds at birth despite being carried past full term, the infant was squalling mad, refusing to give up its birthright in its fight to survive.

  She had immediately named her daughter Stephanie lest there be any doubt as to the infant’s paternity. The child had her bright red hair, but her eyes were as black as Stephen’s. Their almond shape, slightly tilted at the corners, gave an indication of her true heritage only to the most suspect observer – the eyes and, perhaps, her caramel-colored skin.

  "She is beautiful, isn’t she?” Rosemary murmured, and Consuela, who had served once more as midwife, nodded in agreement. In her devotion to la patrona, her mistress, her wise eyes never betrayed what they both knew.

  According to everyone’s calculations, except for those of the two women, the baby came a month early. Stephen, therefore, was still in Santa Fe. Had he been at Cambria at the time of Stephanie’s birth, Rosemary doubted he would have shown any marked interest. He had his son.