Whippoorwill

by Sharon Sala

  “I cannot see this.”

  “See what?” Caitie asked.

  “This hand… or you.” He pointed around him. “I know what is there. I see it from afar. But when I ride close, it disappears, like the dust before a windstorm.”

  Caitie slipped her hand free and then stepped close, waving her hand before his face in a wide sweep. He barely flinched.

  “Oh, oh my.”

  There was little else she could say.

  “Food inside. Water nearby. You find. We talk later.”

  With stoic face, he turned toward the sound of his grazing mount, moving carefully with arms outstretched until he reached the shadowy bulk before him. He walked away, leading his horse. But he wasn’t the only one who could not see. Surprised by the hand fate had dealt the little man, Caitie found herself looking at his world through a blur of tears.

  ***

  The sun was only hours old as Joe Redhawk squatted low to the ground, watching the Bolin Brothers camp, constantly searching the thickets beneath the trees for a sign of the girl.

  He saw nothing but the brothers, heard nothing but their quarrels, and felt a growing sickness in the pit of his stomach that had nothing to do with missing breakfast.

  She’d been so pretty. Feisty and young as she was, she should have been fighting off beaus, not the likes of Milt and Art. Yet no one knew better than Joe Redhawk that life had a way of being unfair.

  Had been pretty? Why do I keep thinking that way? She can’t be dead. I don’t want her to be dead. Hell, I don’t even know her name.

  Anger made him careless. When “Breed” got careless, people often died. He walked into the camp with both guns drawn.

  “Where is she you sorry sons-a-bitches? And don’t be tellin’ me she’s dead, or you’re next.”

  Milt spilled hot coffee on his hands.

  Art fell backward off the stump in the act of trying to draw his gun and busted his head on a rock.

  For Milt, this was the last straw in a series of disasters. He wished to hell and back that he’d never even seen Mudhen Crossing or that stable girl.

  “It’s all your fault!” Milt yelled, glaring at Art who’d addled himself when he fell.

  Art, on the other hand, had more things to worry about besides the gunslinger who’d surprised them in their camp.

  “My head! I think it’s broke.”

  “I asked you a question,” Joe drawled, and just to prove he was serious, cocked the hammers on both guns.

  Glassy-eyed with pain, Art heard the hammers click and looked up. Unaware that the blow to his head had nearly tripled his vision, it looked to him as if a whole posse had them surrounded, but was hard pressed to see which man it was who was aiming down on him.

  “How many are there?” Art asked, and staggered to his feet. “I’ll get the two on the right. You take the rest.”

  Joe crouched. “I said… drop your guns! Do it now!”

  Milt cursed and spit, then followed the Breed’s orders and dropped his piece in the dirt. At Milt’s insistence, Art followed suit, then followed his gun by passing out, face forward into the dirt.

  Milt rolled his eyes and glared at the big half-breed. “Just shoot me now and put me out of my misery. You’d be doin’ me a damned favor, and that’s a fact. Look at him! I never saw such a poor excuse for an outlaw in my entire life.”

  Joe shot in the dirt between Milt’s feet, and then smiled. He had Milt Bolin’s attention.

  “Next time I won’t miss.”

  Art groaned as he clutched his head and rolled over onto his back. “Is it her? Is she back? If she is, so help me God, I’ll take her back to Mudhen Crossing myself,” he said, and then puked all over himself.

  The urge to kill slid out of Joe’s body as quickly as it had appeared. If they feared she was back, then that meant she must still be alive!

  “What’ve you done with her?”

  Breed’s angry voice rang in their ears. For the first time in his life, Milt wished he could trade places with Art.

  “She got away. I don’t know where she is.”

  “The hell you say,” Joe growled, and shot again.

  “Jesus Gawd!” Milt screamed. “I’m done for!” He fell to the ground in pain, his foot clutched tight within his hands.

  “That was just your toe. I’m aimin’ higher next time.”

  Milt dropped his foot and clutched his bloody hands to his crotch. He got the message.

  “We thought she’d passed out. When we untied her, she kicked me in the balls and ran. I couldn’t ’a straddled a horse to save my hide, and Art there… well, see for yerself. He ain’t never done nothin’ right yet. She’s gone. I cain’t rightly say I care where to, either. If you’re going after her, take her gol-danged pack with her. I don’t want no reminders of that bitch anywhere around me.”

  He reached behind him and slung the bag he’d been leaning on toward Joe.

  It hit the dirt at Joe’s feet. He picked it up, hefting it easily in one hand. All her worldly possessions. At the thought, his stomach listed slightly, like a sinking boat.

  Joe stared at the pair before him and thought of just drilling them now. It would put paid to a lot of misery and he was pretty sure he’d feel a whole lot better. He could only imagine how frightened the girl must have been. Yet he couldn’t help but feel some admiration for her spunk. No matter what she was dealt, she kept making the better play. He waved the gun in Milt’s face one last time.

  “I’m going now. But if I don’t find her tracks leading out of this canyon alone, I’ll come back and shoot you both where you lay then look for her body by myself.”

  Milt paled. “You’re a goddamned Injun. You people are supposed to be good at trackin’. Look hard. I ain’t gonna die for somethin’ I didn’t do.”

  Joe’s voice was just above a whisper. “Maybe not. But you’re likely to die from something I do, if you don’t shut the hell up.”

  Milt sucked in the sides of his cheeks, and bit his tongue. Breed got his point across better’n any damned man that he knew.

  Art tried to get up and groaned. Out of frustration, Milt kicked him in the belly, simply because he could.

  Joe was a few hundred yards from his horse when he saw the first set of tracks. Relief overwhelmed him. A slight grin split the seriousness of his expression as he knelt, tracing what she’d left behind with the tips of his fingers. Such a small foot. Such a small woman. But what a big heart. He had a sudden wish he’d been different. Living out the rest of his life with someone like her would be fine. And then he straightened and cursed himself all the way to his horse.

  “Women like her don’t have anything to do with men like me.”

  “Talkin’ to yourself?”

  Joe looked up. Sheriff Bud Williams was leaning against a rock while his horse grazed beside Joe’s.

  “I see you haven’t lost your skill at trackin’,” Joe muttered.

  “Oh, I found you right easy. It’s the Bolin brothers I can’t seem to locate. Maybe you could help me out.” He gave Joe a long, studied look and then frowned. “I heard some shots a while back. I hope you’re not gonna tell me that they drawed down on you, or anything stupid like that.”

  Joe grinned and shook his head. “Naw. They’re back there in the canyon. Pevehouse’s horse is there, too, but the girl is gone. She got away from them. When I find her, I’ll bring her back so she can watch them hang.”

  “Who’d you shoot?” Bud knew his friend too long to imagine that it had been birds he’d been shooting at.

  “More like what I shot, not who. Milt’s only got four toes on his right foot now, but that don’t matter. It’ll just make his boots fit better. Art puked on himself. Other than that, they were fine when I left. However, if you want to bring both of them back alive, you’d best hurry. Old Milt was right pissed at Art. Wouldn’t surprise me if they did each other in.”

  Bud started to grin as Joe mounted his horse. “You keep havin’ all the fun, and I wind up
doing clean-up duty.”

  “Yeah, but you’re the one who’s gettin’ paid. Remember?”

  Minutes later, the canyon was silent, save for the sounds of the sheriff’s horse as he rode into the Bolins’ camp to take them back to jail.

  They went quietly.

  It had not been a good day.

  AN ARMED AND LESS THAN SHINY KNIGHT

  Joe Redhawk started out to find the runaway stable girl with the sun in his face. Now, it rode at his back like a weak, but persistent partner. When night came, he’d be forced to stop and wait for next light before continuing his search. All he could do was hope he found her before it rained. If he lost her trail, chances were that he would lose her, too. The territory was vast, and the residents within were either widely scattered, or constantly on the move.

  “She’s just so damned little.”

  The sound of his own voice startled his horse and himself, as well. Joe shifted in the saddle as his horse shied past a pile of rocks. When they were clear, Joe gave the horse its head, trusting its instincts when he could not see the cause of its alarm. Chances were that a snake lay among the stones, coiled and ready to strike.

  His eyes narrowed as he gauged the mood of the sky and the surrounding hills. Many unseen dangers lay in wait for the unsuspecting, and the girl was as unsuspecting as they came. How she thought she would be able to hide her identity was beyond him. He got mad all over again, remembering what she’d endured at the Bolin Brothers hands.

  He kicked his horse in the flanks, moving it from a canter to a lope as the image of her face danced before his eyes.

  Damn those Bolins. If the Sheriff don’t hang ’em, I just might.

  And so they went, man and horse across the prairie in search of a girl with no name. A half hour later, his horse snorted again, but this time Joe saw the reason why.

  Water!

  A river bed with a good, steady flow beckoned in the shallow valley below. Moments later he dismounted and knelt to fill his canteen a few feet upstream from where his horse was drinking.

  That’s when he saw the tracks at the edge of the bank. The same tracks he’d followed out of the Bolins’ camp and halfway across the prairie. Boot prints like those of a child, or a small woman. His eyes narrowed and a slow smile changed the contours of his face.

  “So, girl, you found yourself some water after all.”

  Relief settled. She was still surviving on her own with little help from anyone else. A sense of pride at her accomplishments kept growing within him. This was the kind of woman a man could trust out here.

  He began to retrace her steps, beginning from the point of entry into the water to her point of exit, but when the unshod tracks of an Indian pony suddenly mingled next to those of the girl, Joe Redhawk broke out in a cold sweat.

  The first few years of his life had been spent with his mother’s people, the Cheyenne. He knew only too well the fate of captive white women within the tribes.

  He glanced at the tracks one last time and then straightened. Resolve settled the nervousness that he’d first felt.

  “This is Arapaho country. At least I know where to start looking. I just don’t know if I’m gonna like what I find.”

  His horse’s ears twitched at the angry rumble of Joe’s voice. He grabbed the trailing reins of the bridle and in one smooth motion, swung up into the saddle and rode away.

  Mile after mile, Joe let himself be led by the faint trails in the prairie grasses and the scents of wood smoke on the night breeze. He found the Arapaho camp just as the new moon rose in the dark night sky. Careful to stay downwind and not alert the camp dogs, he considered his options.

  Riding in now was a possibility. He was well known in the territory. By his birth alone, the Arapaho would acknowledge his right to be in their midst. But his black, bone-straight hair was no longer worn in the fashion of the Cheyenne. Now, it barely fell below collar length. He’d abandoned deerskin leggings and a breechcloth for white man’s pants. He wore boots rather than moccasins, and shaded his face with a wide-brimmed felt hat. And he rode a saddled horse, not an Indian pony with a hand-woven blanket. In the dark, the differences could prove fatal. Being the cautious man that he was, he opted to wait for daylight before riding in.

  Hours later when daylight came, he rode in expecting to find her a hostage. He didn’t expect to see her in charge.

  ***

  One day at a time. One night at a time. That was the way Caitie O’Shea had endured her life thus far. Being held captive by Eyes Like Mole had barely changed her situation. The only difference now was that somewhere between being dunked in the river and nightfall, she’d begun to feel sorry for the weak-eyed little man.

  “You eat now!”

  Caitie rolled her eyes. She’d already eaten when he wasn’t looking and nearly upchucked it all. Now he expected her to swallow more of the foul-looking concoction he kept bubbling in a pot while he hovered only inches away, trying to peer past the shadows between them.

  Aware that he operated on sound as well as sight, she stirred the wooden paddle several times around the pot, making it seem as if she was mixing before dipping.

  Eyes Like Mole grunted, satisfied that she was cooperating with his orders, and settled next to the door of his lodge. If she tried to make a run for it, he would hear her.

  “You will give me fine sons,” Eyes Like Mole announced, just as Caitie was considering the possibility of slipping past him.

  His audacity was unexpected. Caitie crawled to her knees, the wooden paddle from the noxious stew held tight in her fist like a club. “I’ll be givin’ ye a fat lip if ye try a damned thing.”

  Eyes Like Mole sighed and wondered why the spirits of his ancestors had sent him such a stubborn woman.

  “The spirits told me you would come,” Eyes Like Mole argued.

  “I didn’t come. I was after bein’ dragged.” Her voice had risen to just below a shout. When he stood and started toward her, she started to shriek. “And I’m not about layin’ with some weak-eyed heathen just to be provin’ a point.”

  Before he could react, she stormed past him, stomping out of the tepee with blood in her eye, looking wildly around for something larger than the flat stick to use as a weapon.

  ***

  Joe Redhawk was on the slope of the hill, several hundred yards away and about to ride into camp, when he saw a woman running out of a lodge. The long fringed tunic she wore looked just like any other Indian woman’s style of dress, but it was the short red hair and unbounded fury that gave her away.

  He reined in his horse, watching as she grabbed a stick of firewood then turned toward a small, bow-legged man who staggered out of the tepee toward her. From where Joe sat, things didn’t look good. He nudged his horse into a gallop.

  ***

  Caitie turned to face her captor with fury in her stance and fear in her heart. It might be her last action on earth, but she was ready to go out fighting. And then as before, it was the unexpected sound of jeers and laughter that stopped her cold.

  She pivoted. They had an audience. And from their gleeful expressions, they expected Eyes Like Mole to fail. Her anger died.

  Panic, mixed with that of defeat, layered the wild blank look in Eyes Like Mole’s expression. Caitie groaned. A memory of her own childhood came rushing back. Of a time when she’d been humiliated on the streets of Dublin by a gang of young bullies who’d whipped her soundly then laughed when she’d cried. She dropped her head and walked back to Eyes Like Mole, dragging the stick she’d pulled out of the stack.

  “Here.” She handed it to him in as subdued a manner as she could muster. “I’ll not be arguin’ with ye again.”

  It was hard to say who was more shocked, the onlookers, or Eyes Like Mole. He took the stick, aware that she offered more than herself to be beaten. She’d given up her own freedom for his pride.

  His heart swelled. He couldn’t see it, but he knew that his own people were looking at him with respect, and he had the woman to
thank. For that reason alone he could not do as she’d asked. But he could give them both an out by showing that he could be generous, as well as forceful. He waved the club above his head and puffed out his chest.

  “It is good. You learn lesson.”

  Caitie sighed. “I’m thinkin’ I’ll be needin’ me head examined,” then she buried her face in her hands. It was while she wasn’t looking that Joe Redhawk rode into camp.

  “Hey Girl, I’m thinkin’ trouble follows your trail.”

  Caitie jerked with shock then stumbled backward. She’d heard that voice at her back before! In Mudhen Crossing. Just as the Bolin Brothers were about to do her in. She pivoted and at that moment, wished she hadn’t given Eyes Like Mole her stick.

  “You!”

  He looked mad as hell and twice as scary. Although he sat his horse with apparent ease, there was a sense of violence within him she couldn’t ignore.

  And then he spoke, and his rough drawl grated across her conscience. “I’ve tracked you across more miles than I care to count, girl. You sure can cover the territory.”

  Her chin jutted. “And not a whit of me own accord!”

  In spite of the low murmur of the crowd around them, Joe laughed. By damn, but he wanted this woman for himself. He just wasn’t sure she’d be thinking the same. However, all of the feelings he had for her must be dealt with later. He turned to survey the crowd.

  Chief Little Deer knew the man who’d ridden into their camp. Breed was known throughout the territory. But it remained to be seen what purpose he could possibly have for coming here.

  Eyes Like Mole sensed the familiarity between the stranger and his woman and knew that he should do something to regain his status as master. He stepped forward and shouted.

  “Woman! You come!”

  When he heard nothing, the frown on his face deepened.

  Caitie flinched at the tone of his voice, looking to Joe Redhawk for an answer. Joe gave her a nod, yet when he started to talk, it was not what she’d expected.

  “I am Red Hawk of the Cheyenne. I have come for my woman. She became lost on the prairie and I have been tracking her. Who do I have to thank for her care?”