The second time in stirrup Taw's right leg somehow got up and over and he humped down in the saddle, clutching the mane in one hand. Then he closed his eyes again.
The hot, dry beat of sunshine against his eyelids brought Taw back to consciousness. He was lying on soft grass, wrapped in a blanket, his head cushioned on the curve of a saddle placed under it. Blinking in the afternoon light, he saw trees and water to his right. A hundred feet to his left a buckskin mare and black stallion were grazing near the point where the land sloped up steeply to the blue sky above.
There was a soft step behind his line of vision and Christine, dressed for riding, appeared beside him. She knelt with a canteen of water. "Drink?"
Tipping the canteen she said, "How do you feel?"
"Fair."
"You lost a terrible amount of blood before I could tie your arm up." She examined the bandage on his arm. "The artery on the inside of the arm was cut. No bones hurt, though. Can you sit up?"
Taw moved his head from the saddle. It weighed almost too much for his neck to support, and it pounded numbly, making him dizzy with weakness, but he managed to sit up.
"I went back into town last night," she said, reaching for a saddlebag near her. "Brought you some dried beef." She handed him several strips of meat. "It will help build your blood back to normal."
She sat down with her arms wrapped around her legs. "You're dead," she said.
Taw glanced at her with raised eyebrows. "Not yet."
"Your pinto was in front of the house. And—" Her eyes closed briefly and her lips quivered. "And you were dead inside the house. The townspeople have it all figured out now. The rumor was already going around that you engineered the coach robbery. They believe that you and those two badmen from Deadwood took the sacks from the coach and hid them. There were the tracks of three men around the stage. Then you killed them in a fight over how it should be divided. Sheriff Wiley was the first man to get to the house. He says he got there in time to do some of the shooting himself. He's taking credit for killing you."
"They don't think it's Jess in there?"
"That's out of the question. Jess couldn't have downed one of those two gunfighters, let alone both of them. Besides, he was still out trying to find the Cuttler boy, as far as anyone knew."
"Why did you come back?"
Christine thought about it for a minute. "I don't know for certain. I took a room at the Grand Hotel. I was going to take the morning stage out. There was some noise on the street and I went out to see what it was. They were bringing the Cuttler boy in. They said one man alone on a pinto had brought him out of the Indian country. He'd left the boy and rode away when he saw help coming." Christine paused. "I had to find you, to tell you it was a fine thing you'd done."
They were silent for a moment.
Christine stood up and said, "You won't be safe until you're away from here. It's too close to town. Eat some of that meat. It will strengthen you."
She got his washed jacket, shirt and pants from a branch where they'd been drying. "Can you dress yourself?"
He nodded and she walked across the opening beyond the grove to the horses. When Taw was dressed she had the horses ready to go.
Christine put her hand under Taw's elbow and he stepped slowly up into the saddle. Feeling was beginning to come back to his arm and his body, and he sat the black stallion straight. They walked their mounts out of the entrance to the box canyon and turned in a direction away from Pawnee Fork.
They'd traveled across a broad flat and had mounted a gentle slope around a high rock wall when they ran into the troop of cavalry. The horse soldiers were four hundred feet away, moving slowly up and over the hill.
Christine, riding slightly ahead, pulled her horse up as the line of troops wound into view below.
Taw was too weak to make a run. "Ride back and circle left at the foot of the wall!" he said. "Spur that buckskin!"
Christine raised her arm toward the approaching column. "Hello!" she called. In a low voice she said, "Ride with me," and pushed her mount in a walk down the slope toward the cavalry.
The lieutenant leading the men held his hand up and brought the troop to a stop, as Christine and Taw rode up to him. "Why, Mrs. Tawlin! What are you doing out here?"
"I don't believe you've ever met my husband," Christine said. "Lieutenant Cole, Mr. Tawlin."
The officer moved keen, steady eyes from Christine to Taw. "I've seen your stallion once or twice, while passing Pawnee Fork. Beautiful animal, sir."
"Did you hear we were burned out, Lieutenant?" Christine asked.
"Yes, I learned of it this morning. I'm sorry to hear about that, ma'am. My sympathies to you both. And to you, Mr. Tawlin, for the loss of your brother."
"Everything we had went with the house," Christine told him. "Neighbors were kind enough to offer to let us stay with them, but I have relatives living out toward Belle Fourche. We're going to spend a few days with them while we decide what to do." Christine glanced ahead at the vast plain before them, shimmering under the lowering sun. "We'd better be moving along. We want to try to cover a good distance before nightfall."
The lieutenant nodded. "You'll not find hostiles back the way we've come. Good luck." He touched his fingers to his blue hat and waved the troop on.
A corporal looked sharply at Taw as he and Christine rode down the line. Turning to the man abreast of him, he said, "I had them Tawlin fellows mixed up. This one here is worth ten of that brother of his. I seen 'em in a fight once, over to the Fork. The other brother, the gun-fighter, just sat on his butt while this fellow took on the whole place."
"That's the way with them gunfighters. They're nothin' when it comes right down to it." His companion slapped at a deerfly that had come up from the sagebrush to crawl under his sleeve and bite him. "Damn foolish Indian scare. Be glad to get back to the Fort."
The dust scared up by the horses' hoofs took a long time in settling. The troop of cavalry had disappeared over the hill to the east long before the last, vagrant particles had filtered down through the air and to the earth. But the two riders moving downhill were still visible.
It was not until much later, when the evening breezes moved in through the brush and began their practiced, patient job of slowly filling in and leveling off the tracks, that the two tiny dots of movement could no longer be seen on the wide plain to the west.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
The War Wagon Page 13
