Stone Hand

by Charles G. West

  He stopped again, confused and embarrassed. “I’m real sorry, Sarah, I…”

  She did not let him finish but extended her hand to him. “It’s all right. Come…”

  He went to her and took her hand. She pulled him closer to her and placed his hand on her breast. His brain was reeling, unable to do anything but stare at his rough hand against the creamy smooth skin of her breast. When he looked up again, it was to meet her steady gaze and she smiled when their eyes met. Her lips parted, inviting his kiss. He could not help himself. He was lost in his desire for her and he leaned closer to her until finally their lips met. He was lost. Nothing in the world mattered to him at that moment beyond his desire for this woman. She was surprised by the tenderness in his embrace.

  “Wait,” she whispered, “let me put the baby to bed.” He backed away a step, thinking the moment was over. She read the look in his eyes and quickly reassured him. “I’ll just be a moment.”

  He started to stammer something but could not think of anything proper to say. So he remained frozen there, hardly believing what was happening to him. When the baby was settled in his cradle, she came back to him and immediately slid into his arms. Placing both arms around his neck, she pulled his lips down to hers. He responded with a passion that could only be spawned by years of lonely life. She understood his need and met it with equal desire.

  Her passion was a searing flame within her bosom when she led him to her pallet. Even at that moment, she did not try to pretend she was in love with Jason. She knew she was not. But what had started as a charitable act to answer his obvious needs had now progressed to the fulfillment of her own desperate desires.

  He was almost boyish in his fumbling attempts to remove her buckskin dress and she realized that his experience in the act of making love was not a great deal more than her own. “Here, let me do it,” she said and deftly slipped out of her skirt and undergarments. The sight of her naked body was almost too much for him as he hurriedly fumbled with his own clothing. She marveled that this great bear of a man, this Indian fighter of such reputation, was now a boy in her arms, a boy in absolute awe of her body. She led him tenderly until they were joined as one and the rage of his passion took them both away.

  When it was over, she held him in her arms for a long time, letting him absorb the love that was so obviously missing in his life. For that moment she knew he was totally happy and she felt a twinge of sadness that she could not tell him that it would be forever. She almost wished it would be, that she could feel that way for this decent man. But in her heart she knew that she could not lie to herself. She felt he understood and was grateful for the moments of passion. But he, like she, did not speak of love. As much as it pained her to acknowledge it, she knew she could never rid her mind of John Welch. He was not worthy of her love, she admitted that. But common sense did not often enter in when it came to choosing the person one loves.

  She realized her mind was drifting when she heard the baby start to whimper, causing Jason to stir. He had been close to going to sleep on her shoulder. When the baby whimpered again, he rolled over to let her up.

  “Sorry,” she said and hurriedly began to dress. “Let me see what’s wrong with him and then I guess I’d better feed you some supper.”

  “Sarah,” he said, holding her arm for a moment, “I reckon you know I’m not in love with you. I thought I was once.”

  She paused before answering. “Yes, I know.” She took his hand and gave it an affectionate squeeze. Then she went to the baby.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “No, don’t be. It’s all right, I understand.” She smiled and added, “We both had a need and it was very special for me.” There was nothing else to say. They both felt the awkwardness that filled the moment now that it was over.

  “I think I’ll check on the horses before we eat,” he said and excused himself. He needed some time alone. She watched him walk out the door then turned back to the baby.

  * * *

  There was a coolness between them after that night, not at all unfriendly, but one brought about by some degree of embarrassment on the part of both parties. It was as if a barrier had been crossed that would have been better left uncrossed. Sarah tended to spend more time looking after the baby and Jason made sure he did not walk in on her while she might be nursing the infant. An air of extreme politeness developed and after several days of this, Jason began to question whether it had all been a dream that had never really happened at all. Things were back to normal by the time Long Foot and Raven and Magpie returned.

  CHAPTER 15

  “What are you going to do about your father?”

  Sarah glanced up from the deerhide shirt she was sewing for the baby. Magpie had helped her soften the hide and she and Raven had shown great interest in teaching her how to fashion the softened hide into a comfortable garment. She paused for a moment before she answered Jason’s question. “I don’t know,” she stated simply.

  “You know you’ve been gone a year now and he hasn’t heard a word from you. Surely he knows by now that you didn’t go back East.” Jason was concerned that the colonel would have already sent out patrols in search of his daughter, convinced that she had never reached Fort Cobb. Sarah had been confident that he would not pursue the matter once she had gone. She reasoned that they had rarely corresponded before, when she was in school in Baltimore. So she didn’t expect her father to worry about her at all. Jason knew that Sarah’s mother had been dead for more than four years, and since her death Colonel Holder had turned to the army for solace. His daughter had been left to his sister to educate and provide the family a young girl required. Maybe Sarah was right, he concluded. Maybe her aunt in Baltimore was content to believe her niece was still in Oklahoma Territory while her father thought she was back East.

  “Maybe I’ll go back to Baltimore before winter sets in. I guess I can still teach at the school.” She paused as if to reconsider. “They probably think I died,” she said, smiling at the irony of it. “If they could see me sitting here, sewing a deerhide shirt, they’d think I had lost my mind.”

  “I reckon you’ll leave the baby with Raven when you go back.”

  “I don’t know,” she quickly answered. “Maybe, maybe not.”

  This surprised him. “You thinking about taking him with you? Back to Baltimore?”

  “I don’t know,” she repeated curtly.

  He could see that the decision had evidently been weighing heavily on her mind. He turned to look at the baby, sleeping now. “I reckon he’d be a big hit with your proper friends back in Baltimore.” As soon as he said it, he realized how it must have sounded to her. “I’m sorry,” he stammered. “I didn’t mean it to sound like that.”

  At once her face flushed with anger and then after a moment her features relaxed into the calm facade she most often presented. “It’s all right. You’re right, though. My little bastard wouldn’t fit in very well where I’m going. I guess I’ll leave him with Raven. I don’t know. I haven’t made up my mind about what I’ll do.” She gazed at Jason for a long moment as if deciding whether or not she was going to say more. “Jason, I owe you a lot. I’m very grateful for your thoughtfulness and the help you gave me.” She paused when she saw his puzzled expression. “I guess I’m just trying to tell you that I know I’ve been difficult to live with some of the time. But you never got mad or even complained.”

  He shrugged. “I think you’re being a tad hard on yourself. I know this life is mighty hard on someone of your upbringing.”

  “I just want you to know how much I appreciate your help.”

  He laughed. “You’re talking like you’re getting ready to go somewhere.”

  She smiled and nodded her head. “I think I’m ready to go back home if I can call on you one more time to help me.” She sighed. “I’m gonna miss that baby. I still might change my mind about leaving him. God, I never thought it would be such a hard decision.”

>   “When do you want to go?”

  “Not for two or three more weeks, while I’m still feeding the baby.”

  So, he thought on his way out to tend to his horses, she’s going back East after all. It would seem kind of empty around here without her, but the baby would still be here to keep things lively. In the long run, back East was where Sarah ought to be. Then he wondered if Magpie and Raven and Long Foot would stay on. Whatever suits ’em, he decided.

  * * *

  Summer was nearing an end. Raven and Magpie were busy drying meat for the winter now that the tipi was completed. Sarah waited now for Jason and Long Foot to return from a hunting trip in the mountains. Jason had agreed to take her to Denver to arrange for her trip back East before the snows came. She was ready to go. Life on the frontier no longer appealed to her and she yearned to see civilization again, and not just trading post civilization, real civilization with dances and teas and Sunday socials…real houses with tables and chairs…and beds with clean sheets. She wanted to wear dresses with slips and ruffles and dance with men in waistcoats and ties. And she was sick of venison and elk. Oh how she wished Jason would hurry so she could leave his valley.

  A shadow fell across the baby blanket she was working on, causing her to turn toward the open doorway. At last, Jason had returned, she thought. But the figure that blocked the afternoon sunlight was not as tall as Jason. Long Foot? she thought, her eyes squinting from the sunlight that all but blinded her as it created a glaring aura that outlined the figure standing in the door. As her eyes adjusted to the glare, she could see that it was an Indian but it was not Long Foot. Then, in one horrifying second, she recognized him. Stone Hand!

  Frozen with fear upon encountering a demon returned from the grave, Sarah gasped. She was unable to make any other sound. The terror that filled her entire being was threatening to strangle her and she suddenly felt dizzy. The room started to spin around her, and she feared she was about to faint. She closed her eyes and opened them again, desperately hoping the specter was an illusion. It was not. Now she wished she could faint but she could not.

  The Indian grunted something in Cheyenne and reached down behind him and dragged an object through the open doorway. When her eyes were able to focus again, she realized the object was Raven. She was bleeding from her mouth. The blood covered the front of her deerskin bodice. One of her front teeth was missing. Another dangled, broken, barely attached by a root. The sight made Sarah suddenly nauseated. She would never forget the look in Raven’s eyes as she gazed vacantly into space. Stone Hand growled something to the helpless woman and punctuated it with a slap across her face.

  “Baby,” Raven forced through her broken mouth. “He come for baby.” She turned her gaze to stare at Sarah, who was still approaching a state of shock. “His son.”

  Raven’s head slumped forward but Stone Hand reached down and roughly jerked her chin back up. He shouted something at her, at the same time gesturing in Sarah’s direction. Raven dutifully, though painfully, repeated his words in English.

  “You baby’s mother. You go with him, take care of baby. His son.” Raven was silent for a moment then added in a low voice, “You must feed baby. When baby quit nursing he kill you.”

  Sarah realized this last was a warning and not a translation of Stone Hand’s words. She was gripped by a numbing fear that seemed to paralyze her. Stone Hand watched her face closely to see if she understood. Then he placed his foot between Raven’s shoulder blades and forced her facedown on the earthen floor. Without hesitating, he reached down with one hand and grabbed a handful of her hair, forcing her head back. With the other he drew a long knife from his belt and in one quick move reached down and cut her throat. There was but a rasping gurgle, like a person makes clearing his throat, and Raven was gone.

  Sarah did not know she was screaming until the renegade slapped her hard across her face, again and again, until she was quiet. Then he grabbed her by the arm and threw her across the room toward the baby’s cradle. She whirled around to face him, defiant for a brief moment. He stood before her. With one hand, he grabbed his crotch and gestured, taunting, as if inviting her to try it again. Then he slapped her with the back of his hand and pointed to the baby. Gesturing, he made her understand he was ordering her to pick up the baby and go with him. She did as she was told, no longer defiant, for she remembered Raven’s warning and realized the same fate awaited her if she did not prove herself useful. When they started through the door, Stone Hand paused to look down at the still warm body that had been Long Foot’s wife. He stood for a moment as if evaluating a piece of work he had just completed. Satisfied, he bent down and with the knife that had taken her life he sliced off her left eyebrow. Sarah quickly turned her head, sick with terror.

  CHAPTER 16

  Jason guided his horse down through a grassy meadow which was strewn with white boulders and occasional dead logs left by the countless storms that rumbled through the mountain passes. Birdie picked her way carefully around the larger boulders and through the screen of evergreens. A packhorse laden with fresh meat followed behind him. Long Foot brought up the rear, leading a second packhorse. Within a few minutes, they emerged from the trees and topped the ridge along the eastern side of the valley. They were almost home.

  Suddenly Jason threw up his hand and halted the horses. He motioned for silence and listened. There was a sound on the wind. It drifted up from the valley below, at first faint, then gaining in intensity until Long Foot recognized it as a chant. Almost at the same second, they both realized it was a song of mourning they were hearing, a death song, and it was coming from their valley. Jason hesitated no longer. He gave Birdie a firm kick and started off down the ridge at a gallop. Long Foot was close behind.

  They found Magpie sitting before Raven’s tipi. Her dress was open above her waist and her lap was filled with the blood that flowed from the slashes across her breast. She continued to sing her song of mourning as she stared at the two men approaching her. Jason was the first to reach her, dismounting on the run even before Birdie came to a full halt. But she looked past him to Long Foot, sobbing as she told him of the murder of his wife.

  “Stone Hand!” Jason roared in disbelief. “How can that be? I cut him in two. I saw him go down!”

  Long Foot’s grief could not be contained. The scout moaned with a pain that tore at the very core of his soul. He went inside the tipi, where Magpie had carried Raven’s body, and prostrated himself before his dead wife, sobbing in agony. Outside, Jason listened, horrified, while Magpie described the abduction of Sarah and the baby.

  Magpie was alive only because she was up on the north ridge, picking wild berries. She heard screams and hurried back as fast as she could but she was too far from the cabin to be of any help to her sister. When she reached the fork of the stream that divides the base of the valley, it was in time to see the end of the assault. It was Stone Hand, come back from the dead. She hid in the stream while she watched him take the three best horses in the corral. He forced Sarah, with the baby, onto one of the horses while he mounted another. Before leaving, he turned the rest of the horses loose. Then he led Sarah and the spare horse out across the valley toward the south. When he was out of sight, Magpie left her hiding place and ran to the cabin where she found her sister lying in a wide pool of blood, her body still warm.

  It was as if a huge boulder had been dropped upon his chest. Jason was stunned by the young girl’s accounting of the assault. When his senses returned to normal, the shock was replaced by a feeling of urgency approaching panic. He had to find her! He felt sick inside when he let his mind speculate on the torment she might be enduring at the hand of that devil. Stone Hand had somehow survived that fall down the dark shaft inside the cave. Was there a ledge halfway down? And a secret passageway to the outside? Thinking back to that day, it didn’t seem possible. Maybe the bastard was supernatural. After all, Jason had seen many a man die with less serious wounds than those inflicted upon the renegade. He could barely
contain his anxiety to start out after Stone Hand, but he knew he must wait until Long Foot and Magpie prepared Raven’s body for burial.

  Long Foot’s grief was without measure. He cried openly as he and Magpie worked feverishly to fashion a burial platform for his wife. At the same time, a fury was building inside him to avenge her murder. Demon or not, Stone Hand must pay for this deed, the senseless slaughter of an innocent woman. He must pay, and pay dearly. In truth, while Long Foot was fond of Sarah, he was really concerned less with rescuing her than seeking his revenge upon Stone Hand. So he and his sister-in-law worked quickly to prepare Raven for her journey. When it was done, Jason stood ready with the horses and supplies.

  While the burial preparations were proceeding, Jason rode down the valley, hoping to round up the rest of his horses. All the while, as he rounded up the horses, he labored under a heavy cloak of guilt. He would not have blamed Long Foot for feeling Raven’s death was his fault. But Jason had been certain the renegade could not have survived. Long Foot harbored no such notions, however. He did not doubt that Jason had killed Stone Hand. He was convinced that Stone Hand had returned from the spirit world to claim his son.

  They had not scattered far. He found them grazing in the lush grass of the valley. They would need fresh horses, so he turned the two packhorses loose and caught up two to replace them. He rounded up three others and along with the packhorses he drove them back to the cabin. He allowed a fleeting moment of regret for having to leave the rest of his horses behind but he could see no other choice. There was no one to care for them. There was Magpie of course, but he could not leave the young girl there alone. There was no telling when, or even if, they would return to his little valley.

  He had no choice but to dump the fresh meat they had brought back. There was no time to dry it. He packed as much of their dried meat as he thought necessary on the two packhorses. The fresh meat would have to feed the wolves or spoil. Even though the sun was sinking toward the western ridge, they set out after the renegade, not wishing to waste any more time. At the south end of the valley, Jason pulled up before topping the rise that would put the valley behind them. He took one brief look at the little cabin and his empty corral. Two of his Appaloosas had followed them toward the mountain pass but stopped at the stream. Maybe they would stay in the lush valley and not scatter into the hills. His dreams of a horse ranch seemed destroyed at that moment. A few moments was all he spent gazing at what might have been, and then he turned his horse and continued on toward the south pass.