Nate had a disturbing thought. What if they were days away? By the time he got to their camp, they would be long gone, well on their way to the Mississippi.
He would give anything for a horse.
The Big Dipper arced cross the sky until its position told him the time was close to midnight. He was sore and tired and hungry, but he wasn’t about to stop this side of the grave.
“I’m coming, Winona.”
To Nate’s surprise, he got an answer: a bestial growl. Halting, he held his spear low in front of him, the sharpened tip angled up and out. He balanced on the balls of his feet, ready to lunge or spring aside.
What ever growled was feline. Cat sounds were different from wolf and coyote sounds.
Gleaming emerald eyes confirmed his hunch. They were fixed on him with inhuman intensity. The size and shape could only be one animal: a cougar. A hungry cougar.
“Try and you die,” Nate said.
A lot of animals ran at the sound of a human voice. Not this one. Snarling, it stalked closer.
Just what Nate needed. He stamped a foot and shouted, but it had no effect. He roared as a bear would roar, but the cat had figured out he wasn’t a bear. He whooped. He whistled. He shrieked. In frustration he even tried a few cuss words.
A twig snapped to Nate’s right, but he paid it no mind. He mustn’t take his eyes off the cougar. The moment he broke eye contact, it could charge.
The vegetation on the other side of the trail rustled, and despite the cougar, Nate gave a quick look—and felt his blood change to ice.
A second pair of slanted eyes, nearly identical to the first, were peering back at him.
There wasn’t just one cougar.
There were two.
Winona lay on her side facing the fire, pretending to be asleep. Her eyes were open a crack and she was watching Cranston. The nervous bundle of energy, as the whites would say, was standing watch. The rest of the slave hunters, as best she could tell, were asleep. As well they should be. As whites measured time, it had to be close to two in the morning.
Winona hoped the Worths were still awake. Before they lay down, she had whispered what she had in mind.
Samuel, in his eagerness to be free, had been all for it.
But not Emala. “Land sakes. Your plan could get us all killed. As bad as things are, I sure ain’t anxious to breathe dirt.”
“Not so loud,” Samuel had cautioned.
“You can count me in, Mrs. King,” Chickory said.
Randa, to Winona’s surprise, hesitated. “I want to. I really and truly do. But you heard that man called Wesley. We give them trouble and they will hurt us.”
“They can try,” Samuel said. “Now that I’ve tasted freedom, I want more. I want to do as I please for the rest of my days.”
Chickory said quietly, “I’m with you, Pa. Those men beat me. And the others laughed while they were doin’ it. I hate them, Pa. I want to kill every last one.”
“Now, now,” Emala said. “What they did was bad. But if we start actin’ like them, we’re no better than they are.”
“Maybe we aren’t.”
Emala twisted toward her husband. “Did you hear him, Samuel? Do you see what runnin’ has brought down on our heads? Our own flesh and blood, talkin’ as if I’ve never read him a lick of Scripture.”
“What does the Bible have to do with this?” Samuel demanded.
“The Bible has to do with everything. It’s God’s Word on how He wants us to be. Love thy neighbor. Turn the other cheek. Those are the rules we should live by.”
“Are you insane? How can I love someone who is takin’ me back to Georgia to hang? How can I turn the other cheek when all they’ll do is hit me harder.”
“Do you know what your problem is? You have no faith. Thank God I have enough for both of us.”
Now, lying motionless, Winona looked from Wesley to Trumbo to the others. They appeared to be asleep. So too, to her dismay, did Randa and Chickory, who were on the other side of the fire. Winona couldn’t tell about Samuel; he was behind her. Emala, though, had been opening her eyes every now and then, so she might be awake.
Cranston came over to the fire and held his hands out to the flames even though the night wasn’t cold.
“If I was any more bored, I’d scream.”
Winona took that as a good sign. He was more likely to doze off once he sat down—only he didn’t sit down. He made another circuit of the clearing, muttering to himself. He might keep it up until he was relieved in a couple of hours.
Winona would rather deal with him than with the others. He didn’t impress her as being nearly as vicious and dangerous as Olan and Wesley.
Her wrists and ankles were growing numb. She went to move them to restore the blood flow, and caught herself just in time.
She mustn’t let Cranston know she was awake.
He came toward the fire.
Winona’s hopes soared when he bent as if he were going to sit, but he only wanted to shake the coffeepot and see how much coffee was left. Replacing it, he sighed and strolled off toward the horses.
Winona decided to take a gamble. She was close enough to the fire to touch it. She thrust out her arms, and the flames engulfed her bound wrists. Terrible pain shot through her, but she grit her teeth and held her wrists steady for as long as she could stand it. Then, quickly drawing her arms back, she grit her teeth to keep from crying out.
The rope was smoldering, but it hadn’t burned through.
Winona’s wrists, on the other hand, were severely burned. Her skin was in agony. She made certain Cranston was still across the clearing, then went to do it again.
The whites of Emala’s eyes shone in sheer horror. “Don’t!” she whispered. “You’ll hurt yourself worse!”
Winona did it anyway. The pain nearly caused her to black out. She half expected to be burned to the bone when she pulled her arms out of the flames. Only a few strands held the rope together. Gritting her teeth, she tugged and snapped them.
Winona examined her wrists. They were blistered and charred. But she was free, and that was the important thing. She checked on Cranston, wondering what was taking him so long. He was petting his horse!
Winona reminded herself that he was young yet, little more than a boy. But that wouldn’t stop her from doing what she had to.
Feigning a light snore, Winona shifted so her knees were tucked high and her hands were at her ankles. She held her wrists together to give the impression they were still tied and pried at the knots on the rope around her ankles. “Keep an eye out,” she whispered.
Emala nodded, fear in her wide eyes.
Winona thought of Nate; he should have been there by now. Something must have happened. From remarks dropped by her captors, it had to do with Peleg Harrod. The old frontiersman, it turned out, was working for Wesley. She wasn’t surprised. She had instinctively distrusted him when she met him, and her instincts were seldom wrong.
The knots were resisting her attempts. Trumbo had done a good job.
Winona kept at it long after most would have given up. Her charred wrists weltered with pain, but long ago she had learned how to close her mind to discomfort and do what needed doing.
“Psssst,” Emala whispered.
Winona glanced over. “What?” Just then, one of the knots came undone. She attacked the second.
“You asked me to keep watch.”
Preoccupied with the ankle rope, Winona didn’t understand what she was getting at. “You do not want to?”
“Dearie, I’d do just about anything for you. I just thought you’d want to know that he’s coming back.”
Winona shifted toward the horses.
Cranston was halfway to them.
Chapter Fourteen
The cougars were young, two from the same litter, Nate guessed, not yet ready to go their separate ways, hunting together. Because they were young, they were that much more dangerous. Older cougars were wary of humans. These two regarded him as no diff
erent than a deer or an antelope.
Swinging his spear back and forth, Nate sought to keep them at bay. Both slunk closer, snarling fiercely. He wondered which would come at him first.
Nate needed space to move, space to swing and thrust. He slowly backed away. Suddenly he bumped against a tree. He went to sidle around it, and the cougar on the right took a quick bound, cutting him off. He started to move to the left and the other cougar did the same. He was trapped between them with no way to turn.
Nate tried one more time. “Get out of here!” he bellowed. “Go eat something else!”
All the good it did him. Both cats crouched. Both growled. The cougar on the left started to stalk forward. A split second later, so did the cougar on the right.
Nate had fought mountain lions before. Lightning quick with razor claws and knife points for teeth, they were all sinew and ferocity. He would rather fight a bear than a mountain lion any day.
Their eyes gleamed eerily in the star shine. Their bodies were rigid, their tails stiff. They were focused on him and only him.
Nate eased into a crouch. He gave up the advantage of height to have a better advantage, which he demonstrated when the cougar on the left sprang. A living portrait of grace and power and savagery combined, it bared its fangs to rip and tear.
Pivoting, Nate drove the spear tip up and in. It caught the cat where its throat met its chest and sheared all the way through. The tree at Nate’s back kept the sudden weight from bowling him over.
The cougar screeched once and went limp.
Nate shook his spear to get the cat off, but its body was caught fast. He turned toward the other one— and it was already in midair. Instantly, he did the only thing he could. He let go of the spear and grabbed the cat by the throat and one foreleg as it slammed into him. Again the tree kept him on his feet.
Hissing viciously, the cougar bit and clawed. Pain shot up Nate’s arm. Flashing teeth narrowly missed his throat. Whirling, he slammed the cat against the trunk. Claws raked his side and he felt the moist sensation of blood.
What Nate wouldn’t give for a gun or a knife.
He rammed the cat’s head against the tree. He arced a knee into its ribs. He flung the cougar to the ground, but with the incredible agility of its kind, the cat landed on all fours and was at him again in the blink of a feline eye. It came at his legs and he kicked but it sprang nimbly out of reach.
Suddenly squatting, Nate scooped at the ground. With a screech the cougar launched itself at him, and Nate threw dirt and grass into its face, into its eyes.
The cougar landed and scrambled away, blinking over and over, hissing in rage.
Nate had bought himself a few seconds. But his only weapon, the spear, was stuck fast in the other cat. He looked down, looked right and left, and then he looked up. A low branch was a foot above his head. He didn’t hesitate. He jumped, gained a hold.
The cougar became a tawny streak.
Nate cried out. His pants were torn open. So was the flesh underneath. He tried to draw his legs up but the cat clung on, its claws buried. He kicked and lost his hold and fell. Fortunately the cougar let go and leaped to one side.
It came at him again and he punched at its face. Shrieking, the cat swung a claw-tipped paw.
Nate’s sleeve felt wet with blood. He kicked again to keep the cougar away.
The beast crouched low to the ground, its tail swishing.
Nate swung at the same instant it leaped. His knuckles connected with its nose and the cat fell back, yowling. He braced for another attack, but it unexpectedly spun and bounded off into the inky undergrowth.
Nate stayed where he was. He half suspected the cougar would circle around and come at him from the other side. But the seconds became minutes, and it didn’t reappear.
At last, convinced he had driven it off, Nate unfurled. He placed his foot on the dead cougar, gripped the spear with both hands, and pulled. Nothing happened. He tried again with the same result.
“Is it me or the spear?” Nate asked the empty air. Sitting, he propped one foot against the cat’s chest and another against its throat and put all his weight and strength into wrenching the spear out. This time he succeeded, but the effort left him spent and breathing heavily. He wanted to lie back and rest, but an image of Winona filled his mind and heart with tender yearnings.
Nate got to his feet. The spear became a crutch. Turning eastward, he hiked as fast as he could. He became conscious of blood trickling down his hand and dripping from the tips of his fingers. He hitched at his sleeve, but it was too dark to tell how bad it was, except that some of the cuts were deep.
Dizziness washed over him. Stopping, he waited for the attack to pass. All around were the raucous sounds of the night. When he was strong enough he moved on.
The steady drip from his hand compelled him to seek the river. Kneeling on a gravel bar, he hiked his sleeve and plunged his forearm in the water. Of all his cuts, his arm was the worst. He figured to wash it and stop the bleeding and be on his way. He held his arm close to his face and saw that more blood was welling up. Stopping it would take some doing.
Desperate straits called for desperate measures. Nate roved the woods, gathering downed limbs and dry grass for kindling. Harrod had taken his guns and knife and tomahawk but not his possibles bag. Opening it, he took out his fire steel and flint.
Never in his whole life did it take Nate so long to start a fire. Finally sparks set the grass to burning and he puffed on the tiny flames. But they kept dying. Persistence paid off. Eventually he had a fire crackling. He rolled up his sleeve and examined the claw marks in the dancing light, and winced. He needed stitching but he couldn’t do it himself.
Bunching his sleeve around his elbow, Nate grit his teeth and lowered his arm into the flames. The agony was awful. His flesh sizzled. The smell of blood filled the air. He almost blacked out but didn’t. When he was sure he had stanched the flow, he staggered to the gravel bar and submerged his arm. Blessed coolness relieved some of the pain.
Nate didn’t dally. He was thinking of Winona and the Worths. He looked up to get his bearings by the stars and was on his way. But he took only a few strides when more vertigo jumbled his equilibrium. Tottering, he clutched at a cottonwood, missed, and pitched onto his face.
“Winona,” Nate breathed.
And passed out.
Winona King froze. She didn’t think Cranston had noticed her moving, but she stayed perfectly still as he approached the fire. From under her eyelids she watched him refill his cup and sip coffee. He glanced in her direction.
“What are you looking at?”
For a few anxious seconds Winona thought he was talking to her. She was on the verge of replying when Emala answered him.
“I can’t sleep.”
“I don’t care. Quit staring at me. Turn the other way or I’ll come over there and kick your ribs in.”
“Is it me or my skin you dislike so much?”
“I’ve never liked your kind. Your color, your hair—it’s unnatural.”
“And I suppose whites are fine?”
Cranston motioned at her with his cup. “White is better. White is smarter. White is stronger.”
“Bosh, boy. My Samuel could break you in half without tryin’. There’s not any of you as strong as my Samuel is except maybe that big one.”
“Says you.” Cranston turned his back on her. “I don’t want any more of your jabber.”
Winona got the last knot untied. She moved her legs to see if the blood had been cut off; they were fine.
“I never realized how much hate there is in this world,” Emala said to the young slave hunter. “There’s so much hate, if it was water, we’d all of us drown.”
“The stupid things you say,” Cranston said. “Now quiet, damn you. I won’t tell you again.”
Winona was on her feet and moving toward him before he finished speaking. He had a Green River knife in a sheath on his left hip. As silent as could be, she came up behind him,
gripped the knife and eased it out. He felt the movement and his head snapped around just as she plunged the cold steel between his ribs. She knew just where to stab. She wasn’t a warrior, but she had been taught by Touch the Clouds, her cousin and an esteemed Shoshone warrior.
In a situation like this, where her life hinged on the outcome, Touch the Clouds had advised her to go for the heart or the head. She went for the heart, and when the blade was all the way in, she twisted it. She would have sworn she felt his heartstrings tear.
Young Cranston’s eyes grew wide, and he opened his mouth to scream but Winona clamped her other hand over it. He gurgled and stiffened. Fearing he would go into convulsions that would wake the rest of the slave hunters, she kicked his legs out from under him and lowered him to the ground.
Cranston died without another twitch or peep.
Winona glanced at the other whites, but none had stirred. She jerked the knife from Cranston’s body and wet scarlet spurted over her fingers and wrist. His shirt was as good as anything to clean it on. Then she slid the blade into her own sheath. It fit fairly well.
Picking up the rifle, Winona also jammed one of his pistols under her belt. Being armed boosted her confidence. She backed up to where Emala lay and hunkered down to cut her free.
Emala was agog. “You…you…you.”
“I took a life. It is them or us, and it will not be us.”
“I could never do that. ‘Thou shalt not kill.’
” Winona sliced the rope from Emala’s wrists and then the rope around her ankles. “There,” she whispered, and held the knife out to her, hilt first.
Emala scrunched up her face. “You want me to touch that? After you done got blood all over it?”
“I cleaned it.”
“Not good enough.”
“Would you rather die?” Winona shoved the hilt into Emala’s hand. “Cut your husband and children free.”
Shaking with revulsion, Emala sat up. “I never saw the like.”
“You never saw anyone die before?”
“I never met a female like you. Ladies cook and sew and knit. They don’t kill folks.”
“Out here ladies do.”
Only The Strong Page 10
