Bushwhacked

by C. Courtney Joyner

  White Fox stood perfectly in place, letting the wind blow through her hair and the fringing on her jacket, while casting her eyes to Bishop, then Creed, and the rifle Fuller had leveled. She nudged Bishop with her foot and said, “Ována’xaeotse.”

  Bishop released the lapel, but stayed fixed on Creed’s face, which showed no movement, no feeling. He then grabbed the glasses from the low-burning fire, the flames snapping at the metal frames, before cooling them off in the snow. Bishop pressed the glasses into Creed’s palm. “Not even scratched.”

  Fuller didn’t lower the rifle even a quarter inch.

  Creed inspected the lenses with his fingertips before slipping them on. “The Dr. John Bishop I knew would never strike a man in anger.”

  Bishop took a breath. “He’s dead.”

  Creed said, “Then maybe we should bury him.”

  “Or each other.”

  Fuller kept aiming even as Bishop held up his empty right sleeve. “See? Nothing. My temper got the best of me. It won’t again.”

  “But you’re smarter than any man here, Doc. That means you can’t be trusted.”

  White Fox looked to Fuller and again said, “Ována’x-aeotse.”

  Bishop said, “That means ‘calm down.’”

  Fuller held for a few more heartbeats, then rested his rifle on his shoulder. “I know what it means. My mama was half-Cheyenne. Didn’t look like her, though.”

  White Fox unclenched her fists, returning her gaze to the distant trees, which were now sharp black jags against the white, separating the moving snowdrifts from the starless night. The moon fought to break through the heavier clouds, to throw a shred of light on the miles of blanket below, but couldn’t.

  Creed said, “What about the boy? Do you see him?”

  Fuller said, “Not yet.”

  “It’s been exactly one hour.”

  “I don’t have no watch, sir.”

  “Don’t need it; I know what an hour feels like.”

  Creed wiped his eyes under his glasses. “He shouldn’t have gone.”

  “Hector’s chasing rabbits and he ain’t alone. You sent that one with the busted head with him, the loudmouth who always cheats at Monte.”

  “I know all that. Someone needs to find them both.”

  “You want me to stand guard on these two, or start a search party?”

  Fuller half grinned at Bishop, while Creed said, “We’ve got enough guns for the prisoners. Are they sober?”

  “Sober enough.”

  “I’m ordering someone to go into those woods and find Hector!”

  Fuller nodded, about to assure Creed he’d bring Hector back safe, when White Fox bolted. In a single motion, she sprang beyond the firelight, landed in the snow, and then started running for the tree line. Fuller whipped his rifle to his shoulder, pressing his eye against the long sight that was nearly the length of the barrel.

  White Fox darted in one direction, breaking into another, then off again. Animal-fast, but she was shadowboxed by the snow, her back and shoulders coming into brief focus in Fuller’s sight. His trigger finger tightened.

  A shout ripped from Bishop as he blocked Fuller, grabbing the barrel with his left hand even as pistol shots popped from the other hired guns. Fuller hard-swung the rifle, catching Bishop in the shoulder, knocking him back, onto the fire.

  White Fox dove into the trees.

  Creed barked, “Sniper, what do you have?”

  Fuller focused his sight on the movement he could barely make out along the deep shadows of the woods; it was something dark moving through something darker. Fuller wiped snow from the front of the scope with his thumb, and then pressed his eye to the piece, aiming down. “I’m seeing some shadows, but can make out her head. Your call, Captain.”

  Bishop said to Creed and Fuller, “Fox can see in the dark. She’s not escaping—she’s going to find your boy!”

  “We’re losing the shot!”

  Creed finally said, “Don’t take it.”

  Fuller lowered the rifle. “She’s gone.”

  “I recall seeing you pray, Bishop. So you better get to it, begging God to make sure that dog-eater comes back with Hector. Because I am thirsty to have you shot.”

  Bishop said, “But you have to deliver us alive.”

  Creed almost smiled. “A dying man still counts as alive, and that gives me a lot of leeway.”

  * * *

  The dark was enormous and far reaching, growing out of the ground and towering into the surrounding night, where it met more darkness. Thick, mountainous clouds churned high in the Colorado sky, and let no light escape from the stars or the moon.

  Hector sat at the base of one of the huge shapes, straddling the roots that twisted from its trunk into the snow, blowing warmth into his palms. At this hour, the woods weren’t trees, just blackened giants, with a hundred huge arms, and standing so close to each other, they formed an enormous wall to the outside. The path between the trees was scraping-narrow, with each tangled access looking like the next and the next. Moving twenty feet in any direction only confused him more, and so he sat, with three dead rabbits and a man’s corpse beside him.

  Hector blew again into his cupped hands, feeling his own warm breathing against his palms and his face. Even the gloves his mama knit for him weren’t helping. He began rubbing the cold-tingle out of his arms when he heard something: that almost-squeak of a foot pressing into the snow. Hector turned; the movement could be right in front of him or a hundred feet away, but all he could make out was the shadowed dark.

  To Hector, it sounded like a critter, or a person, or another kind of critter. He tried to pull his pistol from his jacket, but the steel felt colder than ice, and the sight got caught on his pocket. He yanked the pistol, a piece of his jacket hanging from the barrel, but with nothing to aim at. Nothing. There was another footfall, that odd sound coming closer. Hector stumbled forward, pulling his leg away from the corpse folded beside him, and brought the pistol up, whipping it from dark shape to dark shape, wanting to shoot. At anyone, or any thing.

  “Hector, put down that gun.”

  Hector gripped the pistol with both hands to steady it as he aimed blindly at the trees. Then he heard, “I’ll take you to camp.”

  White Fox stood before the boy, holding out her hands. Hector blinked, thinking she was another trick of the shadows. “But you can’t talk.”

  White Fox eased the pistol from him, lowered the hammer, and then slipped the pistol behind her belt. She waited until the weapon was secure, with Hector watching, before saying, “You mean I’m only able to speak my Cheyenne? No. I understand. Everything. I hate it, but use your tongue when I choose it.”

  “But why now?”

  “You don’t speak Cheyenne. And you’re afraid.”

  “No, no, I ain’t.” Then Hector nodded with chattering teeth. “Jed died. Right where he’s laying.”

  White Fox bent next to Jed’s body, which was twisted in an impossible position, his legs tangled in the tree’s knotted roots and his head half buried in the snow, a white frosting building on his face.

  Hector said, “We got them rabbits and started back. He tripped and that was it. Said he was dizzy, that his head still hurt from when you hit him.”

  “Onéstôhóné.”

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  “He was a fool.”

  “Uh, yes, ma’am.”

  White Fox struck a match on her leathers, the tiny flame showing the cut between the snow-heavy pines.

  Hector said, “I didn’t see that. We kept goin’ in circles. I was afraid I was gonna end up like Jed.”

  “I know these woods now.”

  “But ain’t you still our prisoner?”

  “Yes.”

  “You could leave me here.”

  “You belong at the camp, at the fire. Néhe’éohtsé’tov.”

  White Fox turned for the tree-break. Hector grabbed the rabbits. “Ma’am, I surely hope you asked me to come with y
ou,” he said and followed her, sidestepping the snow-and-pinecone-covered branches that had walled him in.

  Fox’s movements were quick-sure, weaving around the trees without disturbing them at all while Hector was slapped by the branches as he tried to keep up, icy snow always in his eyes. Every twenty steps or so, he’d reach out to brush Fox’s back, assuring himself she was still in front of him. She’d glance over her shoulder and tell him, in her own English, to hold the rabbits high so not to be torn by nettles. Hector did as he was told.

  Hector said, “I-I got these right off, like I said. But then we lost the sun, and Jed tripped up. Nobody can see in this dark.”

  “Me.”

  “Except you, ma’am.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Snow Blind

  More than an hour had passed, and the image Fuller saw through the long sight was hazy with cold fog: silhouettes coming out of the shadows of the pines, becoming clearer and clearer with each step, as they moved onto the expanse of snow between the trees and Creed’s camp. Fuller lowered his sniper’s rifle when he recognized White Fox, with Hector stumbling behind, keeping the rabbits over his head. Bishop stood.

  Fuller gulped his laugh. “Tarnation.”

  Hector broke from White Fox, churning the snow as he ran toward the fire, waving his three trophies. He called to Creed. The captain grabbed Bishop’s shoulder and pulled himself up, facing Hector’s voice before opening his arms like a father welcoming a son back home. Creed then stiff-backed, froze his arms at his side, and killed the rush of feeling.

  Creed’s guard was barely down, but it didn’t escape Bishop. “Hector’s a good boy, like my son would have been. And Fox made sure he wasn’t lost to you.”

  “That tripe won’t work. Your debt’ll be paid.”

  Hector offered Creed a flustered salute. “Reporting back, sir. Uh, mission accomplished.”

  Creed said, “Not well. I blame Jed for this foolishness.”

  “We lost Jed.”

  “Report?”

  “Uh, he tripped, busted his head again. He’d been sneakin’ from a bottle you didn’t know about, sir. He was pretty drunk.”

  “No more missions, boy. No more losses. Where’s the damn dog-eater?”

  Hector coughed up his words. “Begging your pardon, sir, but she found me. I know I did wrong for the company, but she didn’t. And she talked regular English.”

  “She’s standing with you, Bishop?”

  Bishop absently raised his right arm, as if the shotgun were there, to fire both barrels into the blind man. His anger heating, he chose his words carefully: “White Fox is right here with me, Creed. And you owe her thanks.”

  “Sniper Fuller?”

  Fuller eyed White Fox as she laced her fingers around Bishop’s left hand, then said, “Hell, yes. The prisoners are accounted for, sir.”

  That’s when Fat Gut screamed from the other side of the fire, “My leg’s killin’ me, cuz! You’ve gotta do something!”

  Creed said, “Either cure him or kill him. He’s been a weight on us too long.”

  Bishop said, “You giving me an order, Creed?”

  “And you both better obey it.”

  “Want your man treated? I’ll need my kit.”

  “On my Pride.”

  Fuller stepped around Creed’s tall horse, and opened one of the hand-scrolled saddlebags that draped Pride’s haunches. He took out the shotgun rig, slung it over his shoulder, while finding the medical bag.

  Fuller kept his back to Bishop, making sure he got a good look, teasing him with the rig. The shotgun was less than two feet from Bishop, and he raised his half a right arm as if to reach for the weapon, but Fuller was having his fun. White Fox gently squeezed Bishop’s shoulder.

  “Sorry, Doc, but that special rig ain’t what you asked for.” Fuller laughed, then produced the field kit, giving it to White Fox in a deliberate motion. “It’s a good thing you came back. The doc needs you.” She tucked it under her arm.

  Fuller noted the LT. BISHOP in gold across the leather. “I am surrounded by officers.” Fuller admired the shotgun before putting it back behind Creed’s saddle. “That gun’s a hell of a thing. It’s a part of you, ain’t it?”

  Bishop let the words settle. “When I need it to be.”

  Fuller grinned, but there was nothing friendly there.

  White Fox walked by the painted, stroking him along his withers as she moved to the group of hired guns crouched by their own, small fire. The painted snorted, bobbing his head in recognition. White Fox looked to Bishop, who was right behind her. Their eyes met, passing a message he understood.

  The guns were snickering something, but it was too low to hear. Bishop stood in front of them, waiting for one of them to jaw something else. Nothing came, so he said, “One-armed man and a woman, and we cleaned your clocks pretty good.”

  One of them, sporting a fancy blue kerchief, threw out, “But it didn’t change nothing. You’re here. The squaw had her chance, and she comes back. How mule-ass stupid is that?”

  Fat Gut yelled, “Oh, you’re a great one, Doc! Shoot us, then dig the bullets out! My leg ain’t nothin’ but a lick and a promise, you son of a bitch!”

  Bishop and White Fox settled by Fat Gut, who was sprawled on a filthy blanket, his wounded leg stretched out with a bandage newly pink from leaking. Gut was cradling the Winchester, its stock muddy from where he’d been using the rifle as a crutch, sinking it into the wet ground.

  “Lose the rifle.”

  Fat Gut wrapped his paw around the trigger guard. “That ain’t happening.”

  Bishop said, “You have to be able to sit up so I can do this properly. You can’t with that thing on your chest.”

  Gut looked around at the others: two were ready to shoot, casual as hell, and Blue Kerchief wasn’t tamping down his hatred for Bishop at all. It read on his face, and Gut liked that, so he let Fox take the rifle. She placed it near the med bag.

  Fat Gut said, “Needs more than one hand to shoot it anyways.”

  That’s when the knives came out.

  In the light of Creed’s fire, Fuller drew his Bowie dagger from the beaded sheath on his belt, while thirty feet away, White Fox handed Bishop a surgical blade. Fuller “ringed” the largest of the rabbits, slicing a notch through the fur just above its feet, separating the skin from the leg muscles. As he did this, Bishop laid the surgeon’s blade across Fat Gut’s bandages.

  Gut sniffed, “You and your squaw gonna operate again? I didn’t say nothing about that.”

  “The wound has to be checked, and I need her hands.”

  “Her hands and those nice titties. I like them hangers. How about sharing a little? That’d make me feel a hell of a lot better than what you’re doin’.”

  White Fox didn’t allow herself a reaction to Fat Gut’s mouth. She couldn’t. Instead, she held his leg steady as Bishop cut through the last of the bandages, exposing the wound.

  “She might just finish what she started. She’s taken scalps,” Bishop said as he tossed the bandages into a stained pile. “Got a little infection. I’ll clean it, but it’ll burn.”

  Fat Gut turned his head away, snorting. “Just hurry the hell up. Do it.”

  “Never argue with a patient.”

  By the fire, Fuller tossed Hector the rabbit. “Peel him,” he said before casting his eye back on White Fox, as she wiped a surgeon’s blade, laid it aside, and handed Bishop another.

  Sometime, when Fuller wasn’t watching, Fox had tied her hair tight behind her with a leather thong.

  A feeling nudged Fuller: it was the bristling he felt when there was an enemy sniper close by, but couldn’t be seen. During the war’s last days, he’d climbed a tree to take position, and there had been a Reb, perched on a branch and hidden by leaves, loading a Sharps long-range rifle. He’d gotten him with the same Bowie he was using on Hector’s rabbits. The Reb hadn’t made a sound.

  Now, that bristling was back, and White Fox was the reason. Fuller wa
s ready for her move, prepared to shoulder his weapon. He said to Hector, “She talks English?”

  “Better than me.”

  Creed barked, “Fuller, you can’t skin a jack faster than that? Boy, stop the jabber and get the meat on the fire!”

  Hector said, “Yes, sir!” as he peeled the fur down the big one’s legs to its belly, where it gathered in folds. Sniper Fuller ringed the next jack, cutting quickly, and a little deep, before grabbing the last one, its blood sticky between his fingers.

  White Fox tore a shirt into clean strips, and Fuller whipped around at the sound. The bandages, scalpels, and Winchester were set out between her and Bishop, who was daubing Fat Gut’s wound.

  Creed barked, “Doctor, finish up your business!”

  White Fox regarded the blind man shouting orders before saying, “Exanomóhtá?”

  “Yes.”

  Fat Gut winced. “What the hell’s that?”

  Bishop looked up from the arrow wound. “She asked, am I prepared?”

  The scalpel was a flash from White Fox’s hand into Blue Kerchief’s throat, the blood-jet around the blade instant as Blue fell back, firing his pistol wild into the sky.

  Bishop grabbed the Winchester in front of him, pumped it with his left hand, and blasted the next hired gun who was reaching. The slug sent him spiraling off his feet, his pistol not clearing his holster. He hit the ground red, calling for his ma.

  Fox grabbed the scalpels, then busted Fat Gut’s lower teeth with her heel, cracking his jaw sideways.

  It all took less than a minute.

  Fuller turned, swinging his rifle around on its strap, bringing the sight to his eye, just as Fox leapt on the back of her painted. Fuller thumbed the hammer. Easy kill shot.

  Chaos exploded.

  The painted reared wild, his head whipping from side-to-side, with Fox hanging on, turning the animal on Fuller. The horse’s huge legs smashed Fuller square in the chest like two pistons, tossing the sniper clean off his feet, hard into Creed and Hector, shattering ribs, and Creed’s dark glasses.