by Luke Short
A hundred and fifty yards ahead was the scattering of Ponce’s bucks who had broken from the boulders. At sight of the charging line of mounted troopers, they remained motionless, momentarily stunned with surprise. This was not the way they fought; nor had they ever fought mounted soldiers before. Then the panic hit them, and they milled about in confusion, firing wildly and inaccurately.
Burke rode hard for the center of the band. Holding his fire until he was almost on them, he chose a frightened young buck as his man and rode him down. The impact hurled the buck into a kneeling Apache ahead whose Winchester was already leveled at Burke. The gun went off and the Apache raised his gun as a pike and thrust savagely at Burke. With his pistol arm, Burke fended off the blow, and then he was past, and turning in his saddle, he leveled and shot almost over his horse’s croup into the Apache’s side.
His horse swerved, almost unseating him, as Trooper Breen, still mounted, cut across his path. Burke saw the reins of Breen’s horse flying; the man had both arms folded across his belly, and was swaying drunkenly in the saddle. At the impact of Burke’s horse, Breen pitched sideways and fell, and Burke’s horse caromed off to the right.
Wheeling, Burke roweled his horse to complete the circle and found himself almost alone in swirling dust. The momentum of the first charge had taken the troopers past him, and now he saw the half-dozen desperate Apaches who had withstood the charge firing at the galloping troopers, some of whom had fallen. A score of downed Apaches lay scattered in the choking dust raised by the charge. Burke had already chosen the nearest Apache when he heard the terrified protesting moan of a man to his left. Burke swiveled his glance and saw two Apaches, one stripped, the other in a dirty calico shirt, savagely clubbing a downed trooper with their gun butts. Burke saw that the buck in the calico shirt was Ponce.
Burke fired, and Ponce’s companion ran. Then two troopers, both mouthing the Rebel yell, cut in front of Burke, heading for the remaining Apaches, and Burke had to pull up to avoid collision. As the two riders cleared him, he saw Ponce, dropped on one knee, some thirty yards away, his Winchester slacked hesitantly in his arms. As soon as he identified Burke, he raised his gun. Instinctively, Burke flattened out on the neck of his horse. The shot came immediately, and Burke felt his horse shudder at the impact. As if propelled from a sling, Burke was catapulted over the animal’s head. He landed heavily on his chest in the dust, the breath driven from him.
Gagging, he rolled on his left side so that his pistol arm was free. Ponce shot again. The noise was deafening, and Burke felt the sting of powder. He bent back his head and saw, not ten feet away, Ponce’s squat figure half hidden in dust, levering a shell. Burke was lying on his side; with no time to roll on his belly, he streaked up his pistol and shot immediately at the dust-blurred outline of Ponce, which was canted awkwardly in his vision.
He thought he had missed; he rolled over, panicked, expecting Ponce’s shot, but the barrel of Ponce’s gun slowly tilted down, halted, was inched up again as if he were lifting a ponderous weight. The calico shirt began to stain redly at the belly. Burke shot at the stain and Ponce went over backward, fell heavily, and lay still.
Burke rose now and was immediately aware that something had happened. The close-hand fighting was over; the troopers scattered over the flats who were herding their prisoners back were now under fire themselves from the rocks and from the dunes, behind which the Apaches had filtered. Raines and a half-dozen dismounted troopers were fighting their horses quiet, and kneeling to minimize the target they presented. Even from the timber came shots from the bucks who had taken refuge there.
* * * *
Burke looked bleakly off across the creek, a hot sense of betrayal within him. Where were L and M Troops? K had been left to make the fight alone, and unless they got out of here, the tables would be completely turned on them. They were exposed now.
Burke saw one of the volunteer replacements sitting up in the dust a few yards from him, flexing a bloody arm with a look of bafflement on his young face.
Burke ran to him, helped him to his feet, and half dragged, half carried him toward Raines and the men guarding the prisoners. Lagging troopers were racing toward the same point.
Burke called sharply, “Callahan, take your squad and mount the wounded men. Raines, take the second squad and bind those prisoners. The rest of you scatter and make a run for the rocks. When you get there dismount and get into action at once.”
As the troopers dispersed and rode for the boulders, enough fire was drawn off the wounded to allow Burke and Callahan to mount them. Raines left, directed by Burke to hole up close to the trail, and presently, still under inaccurate fire, Burke mounted the dead Trooper Breen’s horse and headed for the rocks, bringing up the rear.
Fifty feet into the tangle of high boulders, Callahan and two troopers had already found some shade and were making the wounded men comfortable. Burke, stepping out of the saddle close by, heard his dismounted troopers firing, and he felt a savage and wicked anger at this bungling. L and M had never tried to cross.
The rocks held the blasting heat of the overhead sun. Burke took off his hat and wiped his brow with his sleeve.
Looking back over the flats, he caught occasional glimpses of running Apaches. Keeping to cover, they were rallying to attack again, knowing they could win now. These rocks, Burke knew, had won K Troop only temporary respite; this sort of cover suited the Apaches best, and they were shrewd enough to know if they could corner this scattering of deserted troopers here, the soldiers would die. We’ve got to get some help, Burke thought. Damned if we’ll run. I Troop must come to us. There was the trail down to the Quartermaster and across it, along which the ambush was originally laid. Was it still held by the Apaches?
After a moment he called, “Callahan!”
“Yes, sir.” Callahan made the last of the wounded comfortable, then came up beside Burke.
“Callahan, we’ve got to get word to I Troop to cross the creek and reinforce us. The trail over there is the only way to them, and God knows what’s down there.”
He paused, his face set, sobered by the thought of what he had been going to ask of this man.
“You want me to try it, sir?”
“I guess not,” Burke said slowly.
“I’ll make it, sir. Let me try.”
Somebody must go, Burke knew, and he steeled himself and said, “All right. Tell Lieutenant Byas we’re clearing out both sides of the trail, and it’ll be safe for him to bring I Troop across. Tell him to hurry it. Good luck.”
Callahan mounted, rode out of the rocks and turned left, and was lost to sight around the boulders.
Burke now posted the two troopers among the rocks with orders to fire at will and mounted out and turned through the rocks toward the trail. He had traveled only a hundred feet or so when he found Raines and two more troopers hidden back among the rocks. Raines had their prisoners lying flat on the ground, face down, and was directing the fire of the other two troopers.
Dismounting, Burke briefly told Raines his plan, and Raines ordered the waiting troopers to go out and pull in both flanks to the edge of the trail.
When they were gone, Burke stood looking at the half-dozen naked and sweating Apaches stretched belly down on the ground. They were watching him carefully, a hot hatred in their eyes, and he knew that however this fight turned out, it would settle nothing with these people; they had a deep and abiding grudge; nourished by the actions of men like Corinne.
The sound of an approaching horse roused him, and he looked over his shoulder. There, among the boulders, stood Callahan’s horse, riderless, its rump bleeding from a long gash.
Raines and Burke glanced dismally at each other, and Raines said around his tobacco, “You hold these monkeys, Lieutenant. I’ll go.”
Burke was touched with a gray despair. He shook his head. “No. You know what’s got to be done, Raines. Hold that trail open for us. Either kill those devils guarding it or keep them down until we’re through.”
He got into the saddle, just as the slug from a searching shot ricocheted off a near-by boulder. Time was precious now, he knew.
CHAPTER EIGHT
JUSTICE DONE
As he rode on toward the trail, Burke put as many rocks as he could find between him and the Apaches on the flats, but the shooting was uncomfortably close.
When at last he picked up the trail, and turned into it, he saw troopers already forted up behind rocks on either side and shooting.
And then he gave his attention to what lay ahead. The trail, he remembered, twisted and turned between towering rocks, dropping steeply for fifty yards to the bed of the creek, and every rock was big enough to hide a dozen Apaches. Pulling his pistol, he urged his horse into a trot and then roweled him into a run. Then, leaning flat on his neck, he gave him his head. He was going to run through, somehow.
Rounding the first twist in the trail, Burke’s knee was raked savagely against a jutting boulder, but he did not rein in. His horse stumbled once, recovered in time to hurtle around another boulder and take the steep drop in a lunge that almost unseated Burke. And then, coming around another sharp curve, he saw what he had been expecting.
Callahan lay in the trail between precipitous walls. The two Apaches cutting his already mutilated body had had no warning of Burke’s presence until they looked up to find horse and rider hurtling down on them. One buck clawed at the rock in his haste to get out of the way, then turned and ran down the trail.
Burke roweled his horse savagely at the other Apache, who was flattened against the wall, drawing his knife. Burke shot him in the face, then raised his pistol at the buck running ahead, but his hammer fell on an empty chamber.
Freeing his foot from the stirrup, Burke raced his pony up close to the Apache, then kicked out solidly, catching the buck between the shoulders. The buck went down between the pony’s legs and his scream was cut off sharply. Burke yanked his reins up as the buck, tangled among his pony’s legs, tripped him. For a moment, Burke thought the pony would go down, but suddenly he was free and running again.
* * * *
Two more lowering curves in the trail, and Burke saw the gleaming sand of the river bed ahead. From somewhere up the rocks on the right a futile shot searched for him, and then he was in the deep sand of the wash. Under Burke’s urging, the pony labored through it, as an erring marksman among the rocks kept firing swiftly and inaccurately at them.
At the far bank, Burke reined down to a walk for the climb. Pulling onto the bank, he saw Abe Byas and two troopers waiting for him behind a large protecting rock.
Burke swung out of the saddle and said shortly, “Bring your men over, Abe. And make it fast.”
Byas hesitated and Burke’s ragged temper flared. “Damn it, man, you’re reserve and I’m calling on you
“Take it easy, Burke,” Abe said. “I was wondering about the trail.”
“It’s cleared,” Burke said. “Make it fast, Abe, or I’m all that’s left of K.”
Abe gave orders to his sergeant, then turned to regard Burke.
“What happened to L and M Troops?” Burke demanded angrily. “Did they ever cross?”
Byas shook his head. By now, the first of Nick’s scouts were coming at a jog down the trail, and Burke halted them long enough to tell them what he wanted. The trail was being cleared by K Troop. He would lead the scouts and I Troop, dismounted, up the trail, where they would split, travel the edge of the boulder field in both directions for five hundred yards, then, flanking the Apaches, dig them out of the rocks.
Walking across the bed of Quartermaster Creek was a slogging, exhausting job, and Burke’s legs were trembling with weariness when he reached the other side. Without a pause, he started up the trail, Nick ahead of him, Byas behind. Only a scattering of shots had harassed them as they crossed. There was steady fire now above them in the boulders on both sides of the trail but none of it was directed at them, and Burke knew Raines was obeying instructions to keep the Apaches down.
Reaching the top, Burke and Byas divided the squads, two to each side of the trail, and the hunt was on. But it lasted only a matter of minutes. The reinforcing I Troopers, hunting in pairs, and pushing the Apaches from the flanks toward the center where K Troop was waiting, were too much. The Apaches were killed, or gave up, seeing the hopelessness of their position.
When the first scattering of sullen prisoners began to trickle in, Burke sought out Byas, and found him looking over the wounded men. Burke, bone-weary and exhausted and wet with sweat, was leaning up against a rock in a piece of shade when Abe approached.
“You feel like turning over the cleanup job to a junior officer, Abe?”
“All right. Why?”
“Then come with me,” Burke said grimly. “Somebody’s going to answer my questions.”
Byas knew he was referring to L and M’s disappearance.
They borrowed two horses and rode down the trail and across the river. When they reached the timbered crest on the far bank, the trail widened, and Burke reined in to let Abe come abreast of him.
“What happened, now, Abe?”
“I never made it out,” Abe said wearily. “L and M started to cross after your volleys, then they were pulled back. I sent a runner to Ervien asking what was wrong. He came back with the answer that dust had been sighted to his right and rear, that he was pulling back to protect our flank, and for me to have the reserves ready to move.”
Burke’s baleful glance settled on him. “Did you hear any shooting back there, Abe?”
“Not a shot.”
Burke was silent a moment and then murmured, “It better be so.”
When the timber thinned out and they could see the park where the assembly point was, Burke saw that L and M Troops had come in only minutes before. Some of the troops were still loosening cinches. Beyond them, Rush Doll’s packers were just beginning to unload the mules in the shade.
And then Burke saw Ervien. He and the officers of L and M Troops were kneeling in the sun just where he had left them over his map of the battle plan in the center of the park. Rush Doll, hands on hips, was looking over Ervien’s shoulder.
Burke and Abe rode directly up to them and dismounted, and Burke saw instantly by the faces of the officers gathered around Ervien that a bitter argument had been interrupted.
* * * *
Ervien seemed shocked by Burke’s dust-grimed appearance. He rose now as Burke dismounted, and said crisply, “Well, Mister Hanna, what have you to report?”
Burke said with an ominous quiet, “Ponce is dead, twenty-three of his men are dead, and the rest have surrendered. Three dead and three wounded from K Troop.” He paused. “How many dead and wounded in L and M, sir?”
“Look, Burke,” Lieutenant Umberhine said hotly. “I was—”
“Let your commanding officer answer, Brad,” Burke murmured, watching Ervien.
Ervien’s sunburned face flushed a deeper red. “I countermanded Brad’s order to advance across the creek.” His voice was quiet, almost arrogant, and he stood stiffly erect.
“Why, sir?”
“Abe has probably told you. The lookout I posted saw dust clouds to the rear and right of our position. I couldn’t risk leaving our flanks open, so I ordered L and M back to protect our position.”
“And were they hostiles, sir?” Burke asked evenly. “As it turned out, they weren’t,” Ervien said.
“It was me,” Rush Doll drawled. “My pack mules stirred the dust.”
Burke frowned. “What were you doing to the right and rear of L and M Troops, Rush?” he asked. “This was the assembly point.”
“I got the order from the captain through O’Mara,” Rush said slowly, looking toward Ervien.
Ervien nodded. “That’s right. L and M were the bulk of the troops to be supplied. Doll could have followed our advance across the creek much easier than waiting here to move across.”
“You didn’t tell me that, sir,” Umberhine said angrily.
&nb
sp; Ervien looked calmly at him. “An oversight. I apologize, Brad.”
Burke said slowly, “If you knew Doll was coming that route, the dust shouldn’t have surprised you.”
“I didn’t see the dust or its position,” Ervien said impatiently. “It was reported to me by the lookout.”
“Let’s talk to that lookout,” Burke said. “Who was he?”
Ervien hesitated a split second, and then said, “Sergeant O’Mara.”
Umberhine shouted for O’Mara. Burke glanced fleetingly at Byas, who was studying Ervien with a sober puzzlement in his face.
O’Mara broke away from a cluster of troopers, approached, and saluted. Ervien began, “Sergeant, tell—”
“One moment, sir,” Burke said flatly. “I’m going to ask him.” He looked levelly at O’Mara and the sergeant blandly returned his stare. Burke said, “You knew Doll was coming up on L and M’s flank, O’Mara. Who did you think raised that dust?”
“I only reported it, sir,” O’Mara said in his gentle, sly voice. “I was not asked my opinion.”
“If you had been asked your opinion, what would you have said?” Burke asked dryly.
“I’d have said we should protect ourselves till we were sure.”
Burke shifted his glance to Byas and said slowly, “There you are, Abe.”
Ervien said sharply, “There who is, Mister Hanna? Since when are a commanding officer’s orders subject to discussion?”
Burke’s hot glance settled on Ervien now. “Since today, Phil. You pulled out of the fight and left K Troop to be massacred. If we didn’t have the luck of the damned, the lot of us would be dead now. We aren’t—thanks to I Troop.” He looked at the group of officers. “Now hear me. Abe, you’re adjutant and next in command. I demand you place Captain Ervien and Sergeant O’Mara under arrest for dereliction of duty.”
“I demand it, too!” Umberhine said flatly. “Damned if I’ll let any man make me a coward!”
Abe Byas said slowly, “I’d like it a lot better if I knew the reason for this, Burke.”
