The Black Trail

by James W. Marvin

  Crow knew enough of the Apache tongue to understand the joke, though he kept very still, pretending ignorance of their language. He was in a biting rage. Angry with himself at allowing his lust for the pale-skinned English-woman to swamp his caution. The young warriors must have seen them some way off and dismounted from their ponies several hundred paces off along the trail. Creeping nearer on foot and taking care he heard nothing.

  ‘What shall…?’ began Lavinia Woodstock, her body tightening around him in her panic.

  ‘Nothing,’ whispered Crow. ‘Got two chances. None and less.’

  ‘Stand slowly, white man,’ ordered the oldest of the threesome.

  All three of them found it difficult to watch Crow, their eyes locked to the naked body of the woman, her thighs still spread to receive the man. Seeing that gave Crow the germ of an idea, glancing back to see where his gun-belt lay. It was close. The butt of the Purdey was only about eight feet from his hand, though the Peacemaker was trapped under Lavinia’s boots. But the hilt of the sawn-down saber was also easily accessible.

  It was worth a try. There didn’t seem any other option open to them.

  The leader of the boys was becoming impatient. Waving the barrel of the rifle angrily at Crow.

  ‘You hear me. Leave woman. We not hurt you or woman. Stand.’

  It was said with apparent honesty, but Crow also heard the muttered comment from one of the younger Apaches.

  ‘Our women will hurt him and our weapons shall open the flesh of the straw-haired one. I will make her cry out for me before we kill her.’

  Crow lay flat on Lavinia, hiding his head in her neck as though he was terrified to look round. His voice a whisper that she could hardly catch.

  ‘I say “Now” and you throw yourself on your back with your legs spread wide enough for a Butterfield Stage to drive through. Then keep still. Understand?’

  ‘Yes.’ Her throat seemed full of sand and it was all she could do not to start coughing with the tension. Knowing from the inflexible purpose in Crow’s voice that within moments there was going to be killing all around her. Killing that might include her.

  ‘Move, white man, or I shoot you and woman with one bullet.’

  ‘Please don’t hurt me,’ Crow moaned, rolling halfway off the woman, but keeping their bodies linked.

  ‘We will not hurt you.’

  ‘Take her. But spare me.’

  ‘Move, white man. Do not cry like beaten dog.’

  There was contempt on the face of the young Mescalero at the cringing cowardice of the white man.

  ‘No. Take her. Do what you want with her. She’s very good. Hotter than winter fire. Let me go.’

  He had finally pulled apart from her, crawling back on hands and knees, wringing his fingers, mouth working in a simulated panic. Almost weeping in his fear. The Indians half-turned away from him, finding the display of craven terror embarrassing to them.

  ‘Take her. Let me go and take her and I’ll give you anything and you can have a real good time and I don’t care at all and she’s not going to now Lavinia now.’ All delivered in the same mumbled monotone, while he slumped in a gibbering heap, close to where the woman had laid her clothes and he had dropped the gun-belt.

  She closed her eyes at the signal and sat half-up, the movement bringing the stares of the young braves on to her, one of them licking his lips at the sight of the jutting breasts and the erect nipples, down to the shadowed valley between her firm thighs.

  Crow was lying still, face buried in his hands, peering intently through the slits of his fingers. Hoping she had heard all he’d told her. Half of the cake was going to be worse than none at all.

  Lavinia had heard him. With a great scream that might have been horror or anger or fear or anything, she threw herself down again in the dirt, spreading her legs as widely as she could towards the three Apache boys, revealing to them everything that she had to offer.

  The oldest of the boys was called Young Man Whose Shadow Is Smaller Than Most, because he had always been very skinny. This war party was his first command on his own and he was especially proud of the responsibility. Particularly because the other two members of it were his younger brothers. First To Cast His Spear Against An Enemy and Boy Who Does Not Smile. The youngest named that after a hunting accident had left him with a scarred lip.

  Now here were choice victims. A white man who had been scouting for the wagons of the black men. And the woman who had always covered her face but who belonged to the chief of the black men. The giant leader of that party. To catch them in such a way! It was very good. And they could each take this woman, flaunting her nakedness at them in the dirt. It would be so good and worth many songs around the fires of the Mescalero.

  The name of Young Man Whose Shadow Is Smaller Than Most would be changed. To Young Man Whose Cunning Brought Him Many Coups, perhaps.

  But first this wanton bitch, rolling and mewing as if she was in heat would have her fire quenched by him. Him first, and then the brothers.

  The boy sensed his erection swelling against the front of his thin breeches and he felt proud of what he was about to do. There was a flicker of movement from the corner of his seeing, where the white man had been crying for mercy, a poor broken thing.

  The Apache began to turn, a smile of contempt on his face.

  He died not even certain about what he’d seen. The last image imprinted on his sight was so blurred and so unbelievable that he doubted himself. There was the white man, holding something. A gun? Then there was a flash and a burst of smoke. He even heard the crash of the explosion.

  Then he was dead.

  The first barrel of the Purdey spat out its load of ten-gauge shot at less than twelve feet range. The lead ripping into the Apache’s head and shoulders, flaying the skin from his face. Pulping both eyes in their sockets. Smashing the teeth in the gums through torn lips. Blasting him back off his feet to lie near the edge of the cliff, feet kicking and fingers scrabbling in the dust as the life poured away from him.

  His youngest brother, Boy Who Does Not Smile, was even slower in moving. Not seeing Crow snatch up the scatter-gun, his first warning of death being the boom of the Purdey and the sight of his brother toppling backwards, his head obscured by a spray of crimson. The blood dappled his face, warm and salt in his mouth. Too fast for him to even realize what had happened.

  Beginning to turn when there was a ghastly blow to his chest and stomach and he folded over, seeing the earth leap to meet him. Crashing face down, the gun dropping from paralyzed fingers. No sense of pain where the shot had torn his belly apart. Just the cold spreading through him and the tiredness that made closing his eyes seem the most natural movement in the world.

  Lavinia Woodstock had never even dreamed that murder could be done with such lethal expertise. Her eyes were squeezed shut and she never saw Crow make a move. She heard the double boom of the shotgun and a pattering sound in the dust like spring rain. Opening her eyes finally to see one Apache near the drop, his head and shoulders sodden with blood. Another clutching his stomach, where a river of bright arterial crimson billowed out on the dry earth.

  The gun lay smoking by her boots, and Crow wasn’t near it.

  The moment he’d squeezed the second trigger on the sawn-down shotgun Crow was already moving. Letting the weapon drop as he clawed the gold-tasseled hilt of the saber from the other side of the belt. Ignoring the temptation to grab for the butt of the Peacemaker, tangled in under Lavinia’s clothes. Maybe he could have reached it and then killing the third young Mescalero would have been easier. But it might have gotten itself snagged up, and the delay would give the Apache ample time to gun him down in the back.

  Crow had met Jedediah Herne, the top shootist, and had listened to him talking about the art of staying alive.’

  Jed had talked about the odds. The winning and the dying. The quick and the buried.

  ‘Doesn’t matter a damn what the chances are. You take them and maybe you live. Let them li
e on the green cloth in front of you and you’re deader than a town pump.’

  Jed Herne had been a man to listen to. Crow wondered every now and again what had happened to Herne. He’d caught a whisper that the Hunter had finally bought the farm in a skirmish somewheres up north with some Army deserters, but he didn’t place a lot of belief in the rumor. Jed Herne had seemed to him to be the kind of man who’d be around for a long, long time.

  The third of the brothers, First To Cast His Spear Against The Enemy, was the quickest to react to what was happening. Seeing the white man go for the gun, and starting to swing his own rifle round to shoot him. But Crow was too fast. Faster in moving than anything the young Mescalero had ever seen. Faster than a striking prairie rattler. Before he could tighten his finger on the trigger of his gun, both of his brothers were dead. Maybe their hearts still beat for a few more irregular seconds, but both were as dead as you can get.

  And the white man was still coming. Gripping a strange weapon in his right hand. Something yellow dangling from the hilt. It was like the swords that the pony-soldiers carried at their sides. Yet shorter. A butcher’s knife?

  ‘No!’ yelled the young Apache, snapping off a shot at the attacking white man, the bullet gouging out a chunk of rock the size of a woman’s fist from the cliff behind Crow. Missing him by less than a yard.

  There wasn’t time for a second shot from the Mescalero, although he tried for it.

  Crow was a great fighter with a knife. One of the very best. He’d seen enough men on their knees, gazing blankly at the dirt while they coughed up blood from sliced lungs. An amateur came in with the knife held in his hand, ready to stab downwards at his opponent. The easiest blow in the world to parry. The real knife-fighter held his blade low down, ready for the slash upwards at the groin and belly. Difficult to check and difficult to avoid.

  The brave attempted to block the cut at the last moment by swinging the butt of the rifle at Crow’s arm, trying to knock the long weapon from his fist But it was too little and it was too late.

  The 1860, brass-hilted saber had been honed down by the farrier at Fort Buford before Crow turned his back on the United States Cavalry forever. From the knuckle-bow on the guard to the needle point measured two feet and six inches. Taking away the false edge and ending the blade half of the way along the foible, so that the fuller stopped abruptly.

  One or two men had thought that it was a Bowie knife, but it lacked the breadth and the weight.

  In the hands of a man like Crow it was lethal, its length giving him the advantage over shorter blades, while the enormous strength of his wrist enabled him to use it with lightning speed.

  He dodged the clumsy blow from the rifle, ducking under it, the point of the knife stroking across the stretched cotton of the young warrior’s shirt. Opening it up like a gaping mouth. Coming out tipped with blood. It wasn’t a deep wound, but it shocked the Indian and he stepped backwards, dropping his gun, reaching too late for his own knife at the back of his belt.

  Crow was in after him, relentless and strong. Cutting the boy twice on the arm as he tried to fend off the heavy blade. Blood flowing down over his wrist and dripping steadily on the bare rock at his feet.

  Lavinia Woodstock lay unmoving, legs still wide apart, too frightened to move. Watching Crow killing the boy with the brutal efficiency of a butchering machine, thinking what a deadly man he was. Wondering what would happen if he and Mavulamanzi ever crossed each other? Who would win?

  First To Cast His Spear Against The Enemy was growing weaker. Though he had little experience of fighting in real wars, he knew enough to be aware that he was likely to die. The blood ran from the three wounds and he had still not managed even to draw his own knife, certain he would drop it from his slick fingers if he tried again.

  The white man was too good. Too strong and quick. There would at least be no shame in falling in battle against such a man. But there could be one last try. To take him in his arms. They were close to the edge of the rocky cliff and he could hold fast to the lean man in black and pull him to certain death together.

  That was what the boy had decided.

  Crow never gave him the chance. Feinting in on the right, then suddenly switching the cut-down saber to his left hand and plunging it into the young warrior’s stomach. Three fingers’ breadth below his belt. Feeling blood hot against the back of his hand. Pushing the Apache in the chest with his right hand and twisting the hilt of the sword with his left, so it tore a great hacking wound through the Mescalero boy’s abdomen.

  The Apache fell away from Crow, landing only a foot or so from the brink of the ravine, his one hand flopping out and finding only space. Lying helplessly on his back, face to the bright sun. Mouth sagging open in shock and pain.

  As calmly as if he was strolling down the main street of Abilene on a Sunday afternoon, Crow walked across to the dying boy and kicked him savagely in the ribs. Lavinia heard the crack of bones snapping and a cry of pain from the Apache. Crow swung back his leg and kicked again, driving the young brave to the edge of the drop so that his head dangled over the brink. A third kick and the Indian was gone. There was only the distant sound of something clattering among the rocks at the bottom of the arroyo.

  Crow heaved the other two bodies over so that all three brothers lay tangled together in death. Then he stooped and buckled on his belt. Throwing the woman her clothes with a curt warning to dress herself. Crow was still angry at himself for his carelessness, knowing that he’d been lucky.

  Knowing also that next time he might not be so lucky.

  Chapter Eight

  That night, after they had all met up again, and the stories of the day had been told, Crow came close to a cataclysmic row with the Zulu chief. He had told him that in his opinion they were all in great danger from the surrounding Mescalero Apaches, and that they should immediately strike out for Crossworld Springs and a chance of safety.

  He knew well enough that the killing of the three young braves would not go unnoticed by the rest of the tribe and that a party would be sent out for vengeance. With four wagons and sixteen of them riding along, they wouldn’t be hard to find.

  He might as well have suggested to Mavulamanzi that he should creep on his belly and lick up dirt from the trail. The Negro’s eyes almost started out from his head in anger and he clenched his fingers as if he wanted to rend the impudent white man limb from limb.

  ‘No good throwing a tantrum like a whore findin’ someone’s torn her second-best chemise,’ said Crow, quietly. Having decided that there was no point in trying to humor the giant black any further. The situation had become so oppressively dangerous that he was reaching the edge of simply riding away and not looking back.

  ‘You have temeritous suggestions that we awesome for Indian buggers, Crow!’ exploded the chief. ‘That is too damned bloody fuckin’ insult!’ In his rage the black’s command of English was trickling away from him.

  Lavinia Woodstock sat across from the evening fire, with Mikalawayo next to her, his face terrified, contrasting oddly with the jaunty angle of his yellow derby.

  ‘I’m telling you that you must give out guns to all of your men. All of them. And we should now keep together and head back along the trail. Ifn we don’t then we’re going to have the whole damned Apache nation screamin’ around our necks.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You’re making the biggest damned mistake that you ever…’

  ‘You bloody white bastards of ...’ he lapsed for a few moments into his own tongue, then checked himself, visibly fighting for control. Breathing hard. His massive chest heaving so that Crow expected to see him burst clean out of the fancy lace shirt and silk jacket.

  ‘You hire me to scout and ride shotgun for you. I’ve done that so far. Saved your woman…’

  ‘And I am in your debt, Crow. Do you wish for more money? Have another thousand dollars.’

  ‘I’ll take it…’ Crow hesitated, seeing the shock on the Zulu’s face. Smiling inwardly at
having called the chief’s bluff. ‘But only when we get safe back to that township.’

  ‘All of us?’

  ‘Nope. Haven’t signed on for that. To protect you. That’s all.’

  ‘Very well. But we will hunt for one more day, Crow.’

  ‘Might not get another day.’

  ‘We hunt. Today we saw the finest and largest lion of the mountains that I have ever glimmed with these peepers of mine.’

  Now that the anger had subsided, Mavulamanzi had slipped back into the strange English slang that he generally affected.

  ‘Chief Mavulamanzi…’ began Crow, when the Zulu held up an imperious hand.

  ‘No. I have decided. We talk of courage. You have made me lose face by saving the life of that thing…’ pointing at Lavinia, who didn’t move a muscle as he stared at her.

  ‘Because of that we will hunt together, you and me, Crow.’

  The white man wondered just what the black would have done if he’d told him that he’d done a whole lot more than just save Miss Woodstock. It was a thought that he didn’t much relish, bearing in mind some of the stories of despotic vengeance that little Mick had told him.

  ‘And the rest turn around and head out of the way we’ve come?’

  ‘Why not? Together we can take the beast and then o’ertake these sluggardly fellows. Mikalawayo!’

  ‘Yes, your magnificence,’ cringed the younger Negro. ‘It shall all be as you have commanded.’

  ‘Bloody truthful it shall, old chap, or it will be the pointed stick up the bottom-hole for you in jolly double-quick time.’

  It was said in a joking manner, but Crow saw the expression of terror that fluttered across Mikalawayo’s face and knew that the threat wasn’t really a joke at all.

  Crow still wasn’t happy. During the night he’d been woken up when one of the guards reported to Mikalawayo that he had heard many horses passing close by them. Moving fast, he’d said. Small horses. Perhaps twenty or thirty, holding out both hands two and then three times to show the numbers. Crow had developed a healthy admiration for the tracking abilities of the blacks and he believed them. That meant the Mescalero Apaches had found the bodies of their three young braves and were now preparing their plans for revenge.