The Independence Trail

by Lyle Brandt

  The first and foremost rule of any gunfight was to kill or be killed. All else was a potentially lethal distraction.

  And one thing Catlin didn’t plan on tonight was getting killed because he couldn’t focus on what mattered—namely, taking down his enemies.

  The next nearest among them was some fifty yards away, firing a shotgun, likely a ten- or twelve-gauge. That ruled out the shooter being one of Mr. Mossman’s hands, and gave Catlin his next target of opportunity.

  Now all he had to do was manage the approach without tipping his adversary off and taking deadly fire before he had a shot lined up.

  Whether he could accomplish that was anybody’s guess, but Catlin was obliged to try.

  And if he failed . . . well, Art supposed he’d never know the difference.

  * * *

  * * *

  Maska—“Strong”—wondered how much longer he could stand his ground before a white man’s bullet brought him down.

  It was not in his nature to be frightened, quite the opposite in fact, but neither was he fool enough to leave himself exposed to sudden death if there was any viable alternative. And now, hearing their war chief’s high-pitched call for a retreat, Maska knew he must obey.

  But was it shameful that he also felt relieved?

  He fired the second barrel of his ten-gauge coach gun toward the white man’s camp, not bothering to aim from sixty yards but trusting the buckshot to spread and find whatever targets were available. A kill at that range was unlikely, but before he turned and fled, Maska hoped he could at least wound one of the tsayaditl-ti cowboys before his pony bore him off into the night.

  And would their enemies pursue them?

  Likely, he supposed, although they probably would wait for sunrise, pausing first to calm their livestock, then perhaps draw lots to see who would give chase. They would not dare to leave the herd and camp unguarded altogether, and that fact might draw the white men to their deaths.

  If their commander split his force in half, they should then be outnumbered by Apaches—or at least they would if all Maska’s fellow braves were still alive and fit for battle.

  And if not?

  Then he supposed that neither he nor any of his comrades would survive.

  Maska, galloping away with shots still ringing out behind him, had no morbid fear of death per se. He had lost friends and loved ones—some to violence, others to old age or disease—and knew what lay in store for all at their life journey’s end. He was content in the belief that fighting for his people, even in a losing cause, assured him of a place with his ancestors on the Other Side.

  But truth be told, he had no wish to die tonight.

  At least, not without taking white men with him as he fell.

  When he had covered half a mile or more beyond the white men’s camp, Maska paused and slipped fresh cartridges into the breech of his coach gun. He still remembered prying it out of a dead man’s fingers after their war party ambushed a stagecoach along the Gila River, outside Tucson in the Arizona Territory.

  That had been a proud day—eight whites slain and four horses acquired for later sale—boosting the spirits of Maska and his fellow braves.

  Small victories, but when resistance fighters made war on a giant like the U.S. government, with all its horse soldiers and settlers swarming westward, any triumph was a cause for celebration.

  Would they celebrate tomorrow, or be wiped out by their enemies?

  Only the rising sun could tell, and Maska was none too thrilled by what it might reveal.

  * * *

  * * *

  What tribe’s he from?” asked Piney Rollins, bending closer to the prostrate body, lamp in hand.

  Bliss Mossman rolled the corpse onto its back, revealing streaks of war paint on the cheeks and forehead of its flaccid face. “Apache,” he told the assembled drovers. “Mescalero, by the look of him.”

  “Not rustlers, then,” said Merritt Dietz, still mounted on his seal-brown bay stallion.

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” Mossman replied. “They likely meant to make off with as many steers as possible, after they put us down.”

  “Is this the only one who didn’t make it out?” Sterling Tippit inquired.

  “The only one we’ve found so far,” Job Hooper said. He’d led a brief pursuit of the escaping raiders on his liver chestnut mare, but with his two companions—Zimmerman and Guenther—gave it up and doubled back to camp after three quarters of a mile or so.

  “There must have been a dozen of ’em, likely more, from counting muzzle flashes,” Mike Limbaugh chimed in.

  “So, what now, boss?” Linton McCormick asked.

  Bliss Mossman answered with a question of his own. “We’ve got the stock under control for now?”

  “Yes, sir,” the foreman said.

  “All right. I would say we move on and clear out of here come daybreak,” Mossman said, “but that means leaving hostiles on the warpath hereabouts.” He hesitated, then pressed on. “Some of you might say that it’s not our fight, beyond what happens to the herd, and I can see that side of it. But can we just ride off without repaying them for what they did tonight, letting ’em run wild through the territory as they please?”

  When no one answered, Mossman filled the silence. “I believe we ought to hunt ’em down, but I’m not making it an order. Anybody who agrees—up to, say, eight of you—could follow them at daybreak, try to overtake ’em, and be done with it. Or, failing that, stop at the first homestead you come to, tell ’em all about it, and leave them to spread the word. What do you say?”

  It took a moment, standing in the wan lamplight, but all of them eventually nodded, though Art Catlin thought the gesture was a grudging one from several. Mossman nodded in turn and said, “Okay, then. Any volunteers right off?”

  No one had answered when the boss turned to face Catlin, asking, “You dropped this one, Arthur?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Are you willing to go after them that’s left?”

  It seemed a long two seconds before Catlin heard himself reply, “I might as well.”

  “All right, then,” Mossman said. “Sterling, I’ll put you in the lead. Now all we need is six more hands to ride along.”

  Already, Catlin was asking himself, Why in blue blazes didn’t I use common sense and just say no?

  CHAPTER SIX

  Sunday, April 27

  A Sunday morning, but for Catlin it would be no day of rest. After a hasty breakfast, he was on the move with Sterling Tippit and the other drovers who’d been picked to run down the Apache raiders: Luis Chávez, Nehemiah Wolford, Merritt Dietz, Linton McCormick, Julius Pryor, and Zebulon Steinmeier. Those they left behind, their trail boss in command, would drive the herd as far as possible and camp as usual, near dusk, in hope the hunting party would catch up with them before another dawn. Keeping their fingers crossed that everyone they’d said good-bye to after breakfast would return alive and in one piece.

  Art Catlin wondered whether that was likely.

  Despite the herd milling about last night and mounted riders racing every which way, they had little difficulty picking out the trail that their assailants left behind while fleeing south and westward. From the direction they’d gone, it was clear the renegades weren’t running toward a reservation in the territory’s so-called Neutral Strip, but if they’d covered enough ground last night, they could be halfway back to Texas or New Mexico by now.

  Catlin was hoping they’d have stopped to camp out overnight, licking their wounds—if any—or at least mourning the brave they’d lost. The other side of that coin: if they’d ridden through the night, or till their horses threatened to collapse, pursuing them might be a futile enterprise.

  At that point, Catlin had another thought that troubled him, although he kept it to himself. There was a slim chance, maybe one out of
a hundred, that the war party had faked its getaway, planning to double back and strike the herd a second time while Tippit’s hunters wasted time and covered miles pursuing a false trail.

  Art hoped that wasn’t true, but he stopped short of praying for it, since he’d never seen that work for anyone. Catlin had learned that anything he couldn’t manage to accomplish with his hands or tools available most likely wasn’t getting done at all.

  During a momentary stop to rest their horses, some two hours on the trail, McCormick raised a question, asking none of them specifically. “How many of ’em do you think we’re after, anyhow?”

  When no one tried to answer right away, Tippit took it upon himself to try. “Can’t say for sure, the way this grass is trampled down,” he granted. “Guessing, I suppose there has to be a dozen of them, anyway.”

  “Got us outnumbered, then,” said Pryor. “Creeping up on two to one.”

  “Your point is . . . ?” Tippit asked him.

  “Nothing, boss. I’m just saying.”

  “Saying what, exactly, Julius?”

  “Forget it.”

  “That’s a thought,” the foreman said, “considering you knew the odds might be against us when we saddled up.”

  “I’m here, ain’t I?” A whining tone had entered Pryor’s voice.

  “In body,” Tippit granted. “But I need your heart and mind for when we catch up to ’em.”

  If we do, thought Catlin, but he kept it to himself.

  “I’m with you,” Pryor said again.

  “All right, then. Anybody else who’s thinking that we ought to turn around and just forget about last night, I’ll tell you here and now. Cross Mr. M on this, you might as well light out from here and keep on going. There won’t be a place for you with the Bar X, not on this drive or back at Santa Fe.”

  A silent moment passed before Luis Chávez spoke up to ask, “So, are we doing this, or what? The more we sit around palavering, the farther we’ll be chasing them, eh?”

  * * *

  * * *

  At dawn, Paco led his surviving warriors in a mourning song for Yuma, who was no longer among them. During the attack last night, a white man’s bullet had erased Chief’s Son from this plane of existence and dispatched him to his ancestors.

  Denzhone did not join in the song but stood by watching while he held a piece of blood-caked fabric to the ravaged left side of his face. It was a fluke, Paco saw now, that Denzhone had been spared from death. Another inch or less, and rather than being disfigured, he would likely have been killed outright.

  Was that a blessing or a curse?

  Paco had glimpsed the young man’s face, or what was left of it. Assuming that he healed without contracting an infection that poisoned his blood and brain, he would have difficulty speaking and his given name—already cause for passing merriment among his fellow braves—would turn to outright mockery.

  Whether he lived or died, Denzhone would nevermore be found attractive among sighted men, women, or children.

  The Apache word for “face” was shinii’, but offhand, Paco could not recall a term for “hideous.” In Spanish, “Scarface” was Caracortada, but could Denzhone bear to change his name so drastically?

  That was a personal decision, for Denzhone to make in due time, if and when his wound healed. Paco supposed it was a blessing that none of his other braves had suffered injury during the raid last night, although he half expected someone to dispute his leadership after the grim result his planning had achieved.

  No white men killed, as far as he could tell, and they had brought no longhorns with them when they fled the camp. His scheme had failed, costing them one man and perhaps another, if Denzhone’s wound festered.

  And were trackers from the trail drive chasing after them right now?

  As if reading his thoughts, Nashota—“Twin,” whose sibling died at birth—inquired, “How many will pursue us, Paco?”

  The war chief had pondered that all night, while sleep eluded him. Now he replied, “Enough to fight us while the herd moves on. They drive the steers to market, hoping to make money from their flesh. Each day without progress defeats their purpose.”

  “Might they all stay with the herd, then?” Kuruk sounded almost hopeful, but his face did not reflect that optimism.

  “I do not believe so,” said Paco. “We should expect another fight. The only question now is whether to keep running or face them on ground of our own choosing.”

  “You are war chief,” Bodaway reminded him. “The choice is yours.”

  Paco considered that and nodded, frowning.

  “I am tired of running from our enemies,” he said at last. “We stand.”

  * * *

  * * *

  Sterling Tippit reined in his blood bay mare and asked the riders closing in around him, “Everyone see that?”

  In fact, it was impossible to miss: a thread of smoke rising into the washed-out sky before them, something like a mile ahead.

  “You think it’s them, boss?” Nehemiah Wolford asked.

  “That, or it’s something that they set afire,” Tippit replied. “A homestead, maybe, but I doubt there’s smoke enough for that.”

  In fact, it looked more like a campfire’s output, although too far off to say how many individuals—if any—might be clustered around it. Would the raiders he’d been sent to find make camp out in the open and invite attack this way?

  “So, what we gonna do now?” Zeb Steinmeier asked.

  “Much closer and they’re bound to see us coming,” Arthur Catlin said.

  Tippit considered that, removed a telescopic spyglass from an inside pocket of his coat, and held it up for all to see. Finally said, “Move in a little more and have a look at ’em through this. If it’s not Injuns, we ride on a bit and try to keep after their trail.”

  “And if it is them?” Lint McCormick prodded him.

  “Close into rifle range and take ’em out,” Tippit replied.

  A long-range duel wasn’t ideal, he realized, and the Apaches likely had some rifles, too, along with one shotgun they’d used during the raid last night that couldn’t close the distance. Ditto any bows or sidearms they were carrying, which should be visible once he’d applied the telescope. With any luck, his drovers could pick off their riflemen first thing, and pot the rest from there.

  “Just shoot ’em from far off without a call or anything?” asked Merritt Dietz.

  Nearly fuming, Tippit answered back, “You hear ’em give us any warning when they hit the herd last night? When they plugged Frisco in the leg? Who figures that we own ’em any kindness now? Come on, speak up!”

  None of his riders spoke. Facing back toward the smoke spiral rising from the plain ahead, the foreman nodded. Said, “That’s what I thought.”

  He drew the spyglass out to full extension, raised it to his right eye, following the smoke down to its point of origin. From that range, he saw men and horses, no one mounted up as far as he could tell for sure, but all other details were lacking.

  “Still too far away,” he told his posse. “I need to gain another two, three hundred yards on ’em before I get to counting heads and weapons, much less saying if they’re red or white men.”

  Cautiously, he led the way forward, counting his blood bay’s strides as they progressed and marking off the distance covered in his mind. When they’d reduced the distance to three quarters of a mile, he tried the telescope again and this time found himself nearly transported to the outskirts of the distant camp.

  “It’s them, all right,” Tippit declared. “I count thirteen of ’em. One’s got a messed-up face. He’s stanching blood.”

  “Still too far off, I’d say,” Wolford opined.

  “We’ll take it up another hundred yards,” Tippit replied. “Dismount and walk the horses up from here. As soon as we’re in
range, we go to work.”

  * * *

  * * *

  Denzhone, no longer suited to his given name, gently removed the crusty patch of buckskin from his mutilated cheek and saw only a few fresh smears of blood.

  Not bad, considering the damage done.

  If there had been a stream nearby, he might have washed his face, but he was not about to waste the drinking water from his half-empty canteen—another trophy taken from a white homestead that Paco’s war party had set ablaze after its occupants were massacred. They had killed seven whites that day, including four young ones. Denzhone himself had slain a boy of nine or ten years and experienced no guilt from doing so, accounting it an act of self-defense on his people’s behalf.

  Around him, other members of the war party had settled down to wait for whatever was coming, be it riders from the trail drive seeking vengeance or some idle travelers who happened by and found their luck exhausted.

  Either way, Paco clearly intended that the day should not elapse without more white blood being spilled.

  Denzhone sat on dry grass, cross-legged, with his Snider-Enfield rifle braced across his lap. He had confirmed that it was loaded, primed to fire at need, and he almost wished that their pursuers would appear sooner rather than later, to relieve suspense that only added to his suffering.

  Firemaker was approaching him, offering pemmican and asking whether Denzhone wanted some. He did not, but accepted it nonetheless, in the knowledge that he needed food to keep his strength up and to generate replacement of the blood he’d lost.

  Chewing on the uninjured right side of his jaw, Denzhone stifled a groan as that most basic action sent fresh bolts of pain rippling across his wounded face and down his neck, cramping the muscles in his left shoulder. Instead of gnawing on the pemmican, he then resolved to let it soften from saliva in his mouth, until it was more manageable.

  Glancing up, Denzhone saw Bodaway retreating toward the campfire, striding easily until he seemed to stumble, stagger, lurching to his right. At the same instant, Denzhone beheld his fellow warrior’s head bursting as if it were a melon shattered by a tomahawk. A crimson mist of blood and brains hung in the air for just an instant, then Bodaway’s lifeless body toppled to the sod.