
back to the Books page

The Dansing Star

chapters 1 - 4

I
Chasing the Whirlwind

"We've been robbed! Get out of bed! They robbed the bank!"
Pima County deputy sheriff Mort Dansing forced his eyes open and looked up into the face of town councilman Sherm Johnson. Johnson's gray mustache twitched with the speed of his words, and wrinkles dug horizontal ditches across a forehead that stretched far upward toward sparse gray hair.
When the words finally cleared the gates of Dansing's mind, he sat up, swinging his feet to the floor. His short, dark hair was in a sad state, protruding in every direction. With the spit- moistened webbing of his hand, he smoothed his mustache, staring at the floor and gathering his wits. After several seconds he looked back up, blinking to clear his vision.
"Someone gathering a posse?"
"Well, no--that's why I came here. It only happened five minutes ago. Now hurry up, will you? They took near four thousand dollars!"
Dansing rubbed his eyes and shook his head to clear it. "What time is it?"
Johnson hastily jerked his watch from his vest pocket by the chain and peered at it. "Ten thirty. What are you waiting for?"
Dansing squinted up at the councilman through dark brown eyes, narrowed with sleep and irritation. "Ease up on the spurs, Johnson. I ‘ve only been in bed a couple of hours. Give me a chance to wake up, will you?"
"There's no time," Johnson shot back. "Every second you stall assures them that much headstart."
"Watch your choice of words, Johnson. I'll need time to get ready. So while I'm at it, go make yourself useful and start gathering a posse."
The councilman cleared his throat, glaring down his nose. "Don't presume to give me orders, deputy. Why should I do your job for you?"
"So you can keep yours." Dansing stared the councilman down for a moment but decided there was no point arguing with the pillow-gut politician. "Where's the sheriff, anyway?"
"Gone to Tubac to pick up a prisoner. He won't be back for two days."
"Oh, that's right. McGaba. Well, run along and gather that posse. The sooner you get talking, the better."
The councilman's lips pursed, then parted. He stared angrily. Dansing's regard kept him silent, and he turned and stalked out the door.
Dansing smiled. He didn't know why. The situation wasn't even funny. Here he was again in the middle of the hornet's nest. Damn that Johnson. Damn the whole town council. But being at odds with them was nothing new. Like the majority of Arizona citizens, they had no use for an Apache sympathizer like Dansing.
Reaching over, he tugged on his boots and stood up, running his hand over his hair to smooth it to the side. Matted hair covered his chest and a good portion of his belly but failed to hide the sharp ridges of muscle. With his finger, he unconsciously traced the length of a fleshy scar on the inside of his right arm that ran from his armpit to just above his elbow. Another ugly one stretching five inches down his ribs. Numerous marks appeared on the square knuckles of sun-browned hands, but his face, in contrast, was free of blemishes. It was a dark-skinned face of clean lines, its jaw marred only by a day's growth of beard.
Dansing owned only three shirts, and he shrugged into a thin gray cotton one; the day's heat throbbed even into these adobe shadows. He strapped a belt and holster around his hips and plucked a Colt Peacemaker from beneath his pillow.
The year was 1879. That made the Peacemaker six years old; he had bought the first one he could find when they reached the market. Already much of the bluing was rubbed from the gun, and the walnut grips were polished and scarred with use. It was a plain-looking weapon, unembellished. It had cost him only seventeen dollars new, but he hadn't bought it for a bargain. He had bought it because it was honest and simple and showed no pretenses. That made it his kind of gun.
After gathering his necessities for a manhunt, he settled a sweat-stained hat over his hair and drew its barboquejo up loosely under his chin. Then he left the courthouse office and strode down to the livery stable where he boarded his horse.
The livery man had Dansing's horse waiting and saddled when he arrived. Dansing smiled. "You're a good man, Hank. Johnson must've told you I was coming--I guess he's good for one thing. Would you do me one more favor and load up this gear--and fill the canteens? I'll buy you a drink when I get back."
"I'm fillin' two canteens," replied Hank with a winnk. "How ‘bout you buy me two drinks?"
Dansing chuckled. "Sure thing. Thanks, friend."
Dansing went from there to Congress Street, where he entered the dress shop. He hoped to see his friend, Janice Hart, but she had run off on errands. A frown stretched his mouth downward until he reached his next destination, Leigh's Gun Shop. Frank Leigh, a middle-aged man with a drooping mustache, greeted him cordially, looking up from loading a rifle.
"Howdy, Dansing. I hear you need a hand."
"Sure, I need several. You coming along?"
"Wouldn't miss it. I had some cash in the bank myself."
"Good." Dansing walked over and poured himself a cup of coffee from a huge pot on the stove.
"Reckon you got yer chance to show Barden now," Leigh mused, glancing up with a half smile. "You ketch these boys, you'll be a name t' reckon with. You don't ketch ‘em. . . . Well, you'd just best ketch ‘em. Sheriff don't like you much already, I'd say."
Dansing nodded. "Barden doesn't like me at all." It's because of a guilty conscience. He thought this but kept it to himself. William Barden was a popular man in Tucson, self-declared Apache fighter that he was. In Arizona, all Apache fighters were popular men.
In spite of the belief of a later era that every westerner had a horse saddled and tied outside at all times of the day, many of those who inhabited towns didn't even own a horse. They had to rent them from the local stable. So Dansing allowed ample time for gathering of mounts and supplies. He sipped two more cups of coffee, a little more slowly than the first, and tried to stay out of Leigh's way.
When Councilman Johnson came looking for Dansing, he stopped first at Leigh's gunshop. It was common knowledge that because of Dansing's past Leigh was one of Tucson's few "respectable" citizens who would associate with him on a social basis. Johnson walked through the front door, and Dansing set his cup down expectantly, meeting the little man's eyes.
"What's the posse shaping up like?"
"Eight men. Ten, counting you and Leigh."
"What about rations? On such short notice, you can't expect us to have our own."
"Andy Blake will be in the posse," Johnson said impatiently. "He'll bring enough for all." Blake owned the El Pollo Restaurant.
Dansing nodded, taking a quick sip from his cup. "I hope he does. I wouldn't want to be forced to come back early."
"You come back as early as you please," replied Johnson. "And I hope for your sake, Deputy, that you have those four desperadoes with you. If you don't. . . ."
He left the rest unexpressed. Then, answered by Dansing's hard stare and a bland one from Leigh, he turned on his heel and walked out.
Together, Dansing and Leigh made their way across to the livery stable. Hank, standing at the front of the stable with five saddled horses, grinned broadly.
Dansing smiled and passed a judgmental eye over the horses. "You'll cash in big this time, Hank. With any luck, we'll be gone two or three days. Who knows? With your rates, Pima County will owe you its budget for half a year."
"Hell, Danse, you must think I'm money hungry. I'm only smilin' out of happiness t' see yuh."
Dansing laughed. "Sure."
At that moment, the remainder of the posse arrived, and three of them collected horses from Hank. Another three came already mounted and bristling with hardware.
Mort Dansing turned and flung himself into his saddle without touching the stirrup. He looked down at Hank. "You tell that old son of a politician boss of mine he'd best be ready to lick my boots when I get back. I'm bringing in four bank robbers and a pile of money, and I'm going to take his job next election!"

II
Shaken Off The Track

Morton Dansing rode a grullo gelding named Gent, with four black legs and zebra stripes fading away above its knees. It was a short-backed horse with large eyes that studied the vast desert with as much interest as the man himself. With field glasses to his eyes, Dansing scanned the brush country--the brasada. His eyes took in each place mounted men might hide, searching for tell-tale movement or lifting clouds of dust. He gazed at the broken ridges carving into the horizon on every side, all hazy with September heat.
The sun throbbed overhead. It burned down on a hostile country where nothing moved. Nothing but the flies that buzzed about the grullo's face and his, darting in to tickle their sweaty skin.
The posse hadn't made it far. One day into the desert, a sandstorm had overtaken them, buffeting them, sending them to shelter. It ended abruptly, and they shook off the sand, looking about to find the trail gone.
Out there now, only the miles crept on before him, choked with grass and scrub brush and cactus. Not even Mort Dansing, raised and trained by Chiricahua Apaches, could find a trail blown away or buried in sand. His eyes searched the distant mountains, and their blunt and winding canyons and hazy escarpments gave him no hope, no reason to go on.
He returned his glasses to their leather case, then took a swallow from one of his canteens as the grullo stood patiently. Afterward, he poured some in his hat and gave the horse a generous sip, then thumped the cork soundly into the container's mouth and hung it over the saddle horn. Wearily, he swung into leather. For a moment he sat and felt the rock-like seat of the Cheyenne saddle beneath him. He picked up a corner of his long bandanna and vigorously dug the sweat out of his eyes, blinking them to clear his vision. He hung his head and swore, giving the saddle horn a slap.
He had come to the end of the line.
Turning the gelding about, he moved him back the way they had come in the long, steady gait they had maintained all morning. He met his posse two miles back. They were sprawled, whiskered and weary, near a dry waterhole in the bottom of an arroyo. Bushy mesquite trees offered them scanty shade, and some of the posse chewed on the dry, shriveled seed pods from the tree. This was only to occupy time, for a man didn't eat the beans for enjoyment once they were past their prime.
There was no lack of water among the men. Each of them had at least two canteens, and Andy Blake, the owner of El Pollo Restaurant, had brought two extra horses loaded down with water and rations for several days. But if the men felt like Dansing, their throats were parched, their skin dry, their tongues swollen. It didn't seem possible to drink enough. The desert did that to a man-- sapped his vitality, took away even his desire to move.
It was early September. In a normal year seasonal rains would have picked their way across the land most afternoons during July and August, bringing the desert to life. But not this year. The desert was like a dead thing. Its plants had shriveled, their greens turned to gray. The sky was bleached, cloudless. All along the horizon the mountains looked blue, but up close all was gray, tan, brown--lifeless underneath a coat of dust.
Now, on afternoons when the wind and clouds came, it was without moisture, at least none that reached the ground. They brought only lightning and thunder and the choking volcanic sand and dust. Autumn of 1879 showed most waterholes dry, almost every spring shriveled away beneath the desert sands. The roots of the cactus stretched and cried for water. But only the astonishing length of the mesquite tree roots was able to tap the water flowing far beneath the surface of the land.
Dansing looked down expressionlessly at the men who had followed him into the desert. Their faces were guarded, but in the eyes he detected expectation. They were tired of wandering the desert. They were used up. They wanted a reason to move on or an okay to go back. But no one wanted to be the first to give up. Their town had been violated. They had been wronged. Someone should pay. Dansing knew what they felt. He felt it, too.
The deputy sagged from his horse and slapped at his pant legs. Particles of loose sand sifted toward the earth, and white dust drifted off lethargically. Rimmed with salt, his eyes scanned the tired bunch.
Frank Leigh looked up at him. He cleared his throat and spat, a wasted effort. His lips were caked with white from previous attempts. He touched a dry tongue to them, wiped them with his thumb and forefinger. Then he wiped the scum on dusty pants. "See anything out there?"
Dansing grunted. "Just what you see here; the brasada--a lot of brush and cactus. I reckon we might as well head back. Those boys could be fifty miles away--any direction."
"I thought the Apaches taught you to track," jibed one man.
Dansing glanced over. The man wasn't worth a reply, but he gave it anyway.
"Uh-huh. And they taught me when to keep my mouth shut and listen when I didn't know what the hell I was doing. They also taught me the smarts to give up on an impossible track and wait for a better day. You want to go on, the trail's yours."

By way of Gates' stock trail through a natural pass, they made their way over the rugged Sierra Tucson at a fast walk, sparing jaded mounts. The desert's heat sent rivulets of sweat down the horses' dusty flanks. Gent blew through his nostrils, scattering flies, but they alighted again immediately. He blinked and shook his head, plodding on. Saddle leather creaked. Bit chains and spurs jingled. Someone coughed and spat. Steamy sweat ran from beneath Dansing's hat brim and down his back and sides. Why couldn't a breeze blow by to make use of the moisture? When they reached the top of the pass, the Santa Cruz Valley stretched out below, and Dansing sighed discontentedly. His boast to find the bank robbers had gone unaccomplished. Now he would hear about it. The other members of the posse had said little. They, too, had seen the trail wiped away. But when it came down to it they would back Sheriff Barden. All would laugh and agree: Mort Dansing was an Injun lover, but by no means was he an Apache-class tracker.
The dusty buildings of Tucson materialized flat and drab from the desert like part of the landscape itself. The vast majority of the town was adobe brick, some bare, some covered with stucco. Walls one and a half to two feet thick were an attempt to keep the desert heat out and the cool air in. And windows, where they existed, were small and high up the wall of most buildings. There were abandoned brush jacales--huts--on the outskirts where animals went for shelter, and some inhabited by Mexican peons. There were corrals constructed of ocotillo, its wicked spines sometimes carved off and its long, slender branches set in the ground and woven together like some prickly fabric. The hardier ones had taken root and begun to grow again.
Weary travelers called the land barren, but that hardly described it. On the contrary, an abundance of interesting plant life burst forth among the grass and desert rocks. It was said of Arizona that everything either scratched, bit, or clawed. Evidence of this surrounded Tucson on every side. Like scattered troops, stately saguaro cactus towered over the land, their long, ample arms pointing toward the sky. Columns of spikes marched up their trunks in perfect order. The ocotillo, its many arms twisted like tortured serpents, reached out to grab hold of the horses and their riders as they passed. The vicious cholla, with its numerous balls of spines so thick the blade of a stiletto couldn't be inserted without meeting some, hid mischievously in the shadows of the taller plants. There were those who swore pieces of this devilish plant would leap at a man as he passed, sticking fast to bared skin. There was the prickly pear in all its varieties, and the agave and yucca with their stout leaves like knife blades, waiting for one misstep. And last the prolific mesquite with its inch long thorns, the catclaw, whose "claws" could rend flesh to ribbons, and the paloverde, whose pointed green branches were weapons in themselves. This was the type of life that surrounded Tucson, a semblance to Mort Dansing of life in the town itself, where everyone seemed to boast some way to hurt a man, if he let his guard down.
Plodding past the quiet adobes and jacales, Dansing nodded now and then at the Mexicans who watched him and the posse go by. Sometimes they lifted a hand in reply, sometimes they simply stared, expressionless.
Back at the stable, Dansing turned the grullo loose to Hank's care and dusted his hat and clothes off, standing in the shade of the stable's entryway. The rest of the posse had gone to the Border House Cantina to wet their throats and wash the sand from their teeth. Dansing didn't make a habit of drinking, particularly with men he didn't like. They didn't invite him to accompany them anyway, and he was just as glad. He had enjoyed enough of their company to last him forever.
From down the street, someone hailed him, and he turned to look. Young Dan Hough stood beside a bay horse, a man of perhaps twenty years with a speckling of soft blond whiskers and a smiling face. He wore shotgun chaps and a canvas jacket, and the butt of a pistol protruded from the right pocket of his chaps.
"Hello, Dan," Dansing called. He made no move toward him. He was weary, and he knew Hough would come to him; the young man didn't disappoint him.
Hough stopped just short of him with a big grin on his face and thrust out a hand, which Dansing took. "Back so soon? Did you get them fellas?"
"No. A sandstorm came through. It didn't leave much to follow."
"That's too bad. But y' can't win ‘em all." Hough's eyes suddenly brightened. "Say, have you seen the Widow Hart lately?"
"The Widow Hart? Why should I have?"
"Aw, come on." Hough made a playful backhanding motion toward Dansing's chest. "She's somethin', that woman is! You sayin' you don't wanna see her? She's sweet on you."
"Huh! That'll be the day. A sophisticated lady and this saddle bum."
Hough smiled and grinned with a mischievous wink. "Well, you can't ever tell. Say, I just got paid. Wanna come over to the Cosmopolitan and get some vittles? I hear they're servin' a bear they killed up Sabino Canyon. A grizzly, they say."
"Grizzly, huh? Ah, I think I'll pass today, Dan, but maybe some other time."
Hough's eyes fell momentarily. "Well, all right. But you change yer mind you know where I'll be."
They shook hands and parted, and Dansing, after he was certain Hough was out of sight, started up Congress Street toward the dress shop.
Word must have preceded the posse's arrival, for as he neared the dress shop he spied his friend Janice Hart standing in front watching him. His heart faltered as a smile lit her face, and he noted with a wry smile of his own there were more pairs of eyes than his watching her--something he had become accustomed to.
Janice Hart was a beauty, a rare flower growing in the desert. A woman so lovely that at the moment she seemed to Dansing like an apparition. Under the tiny suggestion of a hat, her hair glistened softly in the sunlight, like a raven's wings. She wore it pinned up in the conservative style of the day--the mode of a lady who cared about appearances. It framed a perfect face whose ivory skin was shaded pink along the smooth ridge of high-boned cheeks. Janice wore a neck-hugging white chemise with a cameo at the throat, and a ground sweeping dark blue skirt.
Janice raised her hand and waved. Dansing crossed the street, trying to ignore the envious gazes which followed him. He stopped in front of her, making sure to leave enough space so she wouldn't misjudge his intentions.
Removing his hat, he pushed the loose strands of his hair back in place. His forehead, though darkly complected, appeared pale against his sun-blackened face. Like most westerners, his hat, unless indoors, seldom left his head.
"Hello, Morton." Janice's smile revealed perfect white teeth. She reached out hesitantly and squeezed his hand, holding it for several seconds, until he felt heat rise to his face.
"It's good to see you, Janice." He smiled and shifted the bulk of his weight to one foot. "Wanna join me over at the Shoo Fly for dinner?"
Janice stood for a moment and ran a glance along the street. Suddenly she looked back at Dansing, stepped forward and gave him a quick embrace, crushing the down the crown of the hat he still held in front of him. She stepped back immediately to the leave the same gap of comfort he had chosen.
Taken by surprise, Dansing's face flushed, visible even under his tan and his heavy whiskers. He looked around to see who was watching, and Janice laughed lightly, her face coloring, too. "I'm glad you're back," she said quickly. "I was worried about you." Her voice could have melted the heart of a dragon.
Still embarrassed, but aware of the sisterly way Janice felt for him, Dansing smiled and eased the crown of his hat back in shape. Then he settled it on his head. He took a breath to slow his heart and put himself back in his place as the woman's friend and nothing more. He stepped closer and offered her his arm, which she took, and they walked side by side down the street.
Inside the cool shadows of the Shoo Fly, they sat at a corner table and ordered their meal. Sitting so close to the woman, smelling the lilac scent of her cologne, feeling her gaze, Mort Dansing was strongly reminded how a woman could affect a man, even unintentionally. For a moment, he let his thoughts wander, then clamped them off and looked up into her eyes.
Those eyes were Janice Hart's real jewels--what had drawn him to her as if he were under a spell. They sparkled like two dark emeralds, set just right and accented by slightly arched black brows. Dim candle light reached them, made them glow like deep green flames. He swallowed and looked at her musingly.
Janice looked away and sipped from her glass of rose-red wine. She looked back at him, and that stirring fire was gone from her eyes, but not from his heart.
"Did you get your men?"
Glad of the change of conversation, Dansing shook his head. "I reckon you heard I didn't, since you knew we were back before I even saw you. I guess you heard we were empty-handed."
Janice laughed, her eyes dropping. "Yes, you're right. What happened?"
"A sandstorm came up the first evening. Wiped out every track. They're gone, and the money with them." He looked down soberly at his glass, swirling its ruby-colored contents.
"It's all right. Anyone would have lost them under those conditions. Even an Apache. Everyone will know you tried."
"Sure, they'll know it--in the privacy of their homes, but not in public. You see, for a man with my past it's not enough to try. This is just another mark in the sheriff's tally book. He'll hold it against me like he always does."
With a frown, Janice shook her head. "Oh, forget that man. He's evil. Anyway, I wish you'd just find another occupation that isn't so dangerous."
"Worried about me?" he asked teasingly.
"Certainly." Her eyes were reproachful. "When you ride out like that, so fast we can't even say good-bye, I never know if I'll see you again or maybe just your horse coming back alone." She looked away abruptly and stared past him at the wall. When she looked back, her eyes glistened moistly.
"I'm sorry, Janice." Her emotion made him uneasy. "It is dangerous, I know. But so is everything else I could land a job at. I'm no businessman. And I'd rather not die in a mine cave-in or underneath a mad bull. And what else could a man like me do?"
Janice laughed and rolled her eyes. "Why, that's a preposterous question! You are probably as well-educated as the majority of teachers in this Territory. There are many occupations you would excel at."
"But I have to work outside. I suppose it comes down to that. I'd die if I was cooped up all day."
"Well at least you admit the truth when pressed to it," the woman said with a teasing smile.
He looked down at her hands, sitting soft and pale, conspicuously encroaching on his side of the table. He thought about placing a hand over hers. He ached to, in fact, but didn't want to scare her. Their friendship was too dear to risk. He had never yet held her hand. Nor had he kissed her-- even on the cheek, or as much as taken her in his arms, though now she couldn't say the same for herself. He fondly recalled that moment on the street, and his heart rate quickened. He felt ashamed. Janice would be shocked if she knew he had imagined her for a second as anything more than a friend.
"Is this the right time to tell me about your Apache wife?" Janice suddenly asked, trying to look at him but unable to meet his eyes. "You said to remind you."
The woman's question brought back a wash of poignant memories. Many good ones, some bad. Even the good ones saddened Dansing. His wife. His only love--Happy. That was the name he remembered her by. Her full Chiricahua name translated loosely to Happy, She Walks in the Leaves.
Dansing shook himself past the painful canyon of his thoughts and met Janice's eyes. "Actually, I'm pretty well beat. If you don't mind, I think I'll be in more of a mood tomorrow night over supper. If you'll join me." Perhaps he could prepare himself emotionally for that conversation by then.
Janice smiled and replied quickly, her eyes lighting up. "Of course. I'd be happy to."
"Good. I'll stop by your house at six o'clock. We'll go to the Cosmopolitan."
When their meal was served, they ate in silence, engaging only occasionally in idle conversation. Dansing was too tired for talk, and Janice must have sensed this. He watched the woman's delicate hands guide knife and fork in cutting her steak. He smiled sleepily as he watched her take each morsel from her fork. He wished he could hold her. It would be a long and lonely night.

On duty that night, Deputy Mort Dansing wandered down lively Maiden Lane. The tiny street in the center of town was known to the Mexicans as Calle de la India Triste--the street of the sad Indian girl. It traversed the heart of Tucson's sporting district, forming one leg of the whore- and gambler- and drunkard-infested triangular block of businesses known as "the Wedge." From where Maiden Lane reared out of the bowels of Myers Street to where it merged ingloriously into Congress Street, a curious and foolishly bold soul could walk some nights and witness every kind of corruption imaginable. Other nights, the same traveler would be fortunate to make it down that street alive.
Tonight was September sixteenth, the celebration of Mexican independence. The fiesta would run late into the night, and already the sound of ringing laughter and occasional gunfire and fireworks bounced along the streets. From far off, he could hear the blaring brass tones of the military band, and he passed a Mexican cantina with a three piece band playing to an already lively baile.
Saloon, brothel, and gambling hall windows lit the street, making barrancas out of wagon ruts, craters out of hoof or boot prints, and glowing in cold luminescence on hitching rails, water troughs, and awning posts. The smell of beans, chiles, meat, and fried corn tortillas drifted on swirling breezes, intermingled with that of cigar and pipe smoke, cheap perfume and cheaper aguardiente--liquor. The pervading aroma, especially in the cooler hours, was that from mesquite cook fires.
In several of the doorways Dansing passed he saw women. Although their faces were painted, their eyes were usually dull, their voices pretentious. Gowns of all colors and fabrics adorned them, in styles from alluring to downright brazen. A lone Chinese girl leaned against a saloon, her dark, slanted eyes averted coyly. There were a couple of white women, too, but most were Mexican, senoritas of "easy virtue." They smiled unabashedly as he passed.
Most of the women Dansing saw didn't remain long in one place. It was Saturday night, and soldiers, miners, gamblers, cowboys, drifters, and all sorts of hangers-on filled the sporting establishments and streets. Women were in high demand.
Since he had hired on as deputy these had been Mort Dansing's kind of people. This was his element and his perception of the town. He was by and large a nocturnal man, and most of these night people knew him by name. They recognized him and respected him as a fair lawman but a tough one to tangle with--what they called a buscadero. He was a man who understood the sporting crowd, their need for release after a grueling week. He didn't make the laws, but he enforced them if enforcing them suited the situation. And once he made a decision, no man would back him down. He had put men in the hospital who had tried.
The people who roamed Maiden Lane in the nighttime and inhabited the Wedge never sided totally with Dansing because he worked the "other side." But a good share of them, even the really hard ones, liked him. The greetings he heard as he passed by darkened doorways were genuine, though some of the feminine voices teased provocatively. His in return were real, too. He sensed there were lawless people in this town who would stick up for him in a fight if it ever came down to life or death.
The Border House was alive with chatter, and Dansing stopped outside, listening to the din. He leaned against an awning post and surveyed the street, trying not to let his eyes rest too long on any one person. A borracho sat slumped against the adobe wall. He sang drunkenly to himself about lost love and spilled tequila. Across the street stood a Mexican girl no more than fifteen. Still young enough to be pretty, despite the gaudy makeup that marred her cheeks and long eyelashes. Dansing never went to those women. They let him know he was welcome, but women of the night were not one of his weaknesses. As much as he enjoyed an intimate moment with a female, he wouldn't pay for the privilege. Thinking of spending even an hour with one of the women of Maiden Lane left him cold and empty inside. Without true feelings, a man would be a fool to let a woman lead him away, and one thing Mort Dansing had learned from his Apache mentors was self control. He didn't consider himself a saint, by any means, but until a lady came along who could give herself completely to one man, abstinence from women's charms was his path of choice.
These thoughts made his mind turn to Janice Hart. He was ashamed she even came to mind in such close proximity to these ladies of the night. Yet his thoughts traveled to enjoyable moments they had spent together. Evenings dining at the Cosmopolitan Hotel on Pennington Street, going to the Fourth of July parade or the Cinco de Mayo fiesta. Evening promenades along the edge of town and through the old walled city. Soldiers' band concerts in Military Plaza, at Fort Lowell. Horseback rides along Rillito Creek, and particularly one special ride along the banks of the whispering Santa Cruz when they had rested under a sycamore and she had sat close enough for him to smell her skin. That night he had come very close to asking for a kiss. But he knew they were only two people drawn together out of loneliness, looking for a kindred spirit. He could never hurt the friendship they shared.
Shaking these thoughts from his head, Dansing turned and walked into the Border House. Wreaths of blue smoke and the odor of alcohol assaulted his senses, burned his nose and eyes. Intermingled salutations and curses filled his ears. Various games of chance--or games of no chance, as he called them--were in progress at several tables, and a pair of Mexicans sat on stools, one picking a mandolin, the other a soft guitar. They played a Spanish song, El Perro Viejo, and the guitar player sang in a crooning baritone.
"Perro viejo, mi perro viejo. Perro viejo, por favor no te mueras." Dansing had seen the song bring tears to the eyes of tougher men than he. "Old dog, my old dog. Old dog, please don't die." A lot of folks had a soft spot for the poor old canine, even those who would laugh at a man as he died in his blood.
Dansing wove his way through the Border House patrons to a table in the rear where a man sat braiding leather--barboquejos, or hat strings; hatbands; halters; quirts. A sample or two of each lay before him, among the scattered ashes of his cigarettes. The man was John Laynee. In seventy- six, he had belonged to the Castor Vigilantes. Dansing had ridden beside him.
Laynee looked up when Dansing's shadow rolled across the table. "Evenin', Danse. Set a spell."
Dansing declined the offer. He studied Laynee's fingers as they deftly wove four strands of leather into one. "How's business, John?"
Laynee shrugged, hardly breaking his pace. "I'm alive."
Dansing's mind drifted back three years as he watched Laynee's hands. Laynee used to be a gunman--a good one. Then one night it all ended, when Laynee went down under the gun of the infamous Silver-Beard Sloan.
"Hey, you hear anything from the Captain?" Laynee suddenly asked.
Dansing quickly smiled and shook his head. It seemed he and Laynee could never complete a conversation without one of them mentioning Captain Tappan Kittery, the man who had led the Castor Vigilantes into and through their last bloody days. Absently, he pulled back the chair across from Laynee and sat down.
"I haven't seen him in over a year. He and his wife had another kid, I'm told. He sold the store in Castor, and he's spending all his time on the ranch. He keeps a token marshal's badge, but I don't think he uses it much. Good old Cap. We oughtta ride down there for a visit sometime."
Dansing stopped his chatter there, suddenly realizing how mention of Kittery's name had loosened his tongue. He had never been a talkative man, but Kittery brought the words out of him. Tappan Kittery was the most man he guessed he'd ever met. Sometimes he wished he was even half the man Kittery was. In his mind, no one stood above Tappan Kittery--not in heart nor in strength.
The sounds of a ruckus arose from outside, and Dansing excused himself. He walked quickly to the front door. The noise came from the end of the street, where the Wedge intersected Stone and Congress Streets. Dansing pushed through the doorway and moved in that direction, his heart rate quickening. As he turned onto Stone, his eyes fell upon a large gathering, and from the boisterous sound of the crowd they were watching a fight.
Knowing the sometimes harsh humor of the Maiden Lane crowd, Dansing drew his pistol before wading into the melee. Otherwise, someone else was likely to remove it for him as he passed. He pushed into the crowd, ramming people aside with his shoulders. He reached the center of the circle and to find two men, a Mexican and a white, involved in a hand to hand brawl. The white man he recognized as a miner by the name of Aaron Bragg.
Dansing wasn't fool enough to stop the fight. His policy was to let two men fight out their differences like men will. Otherwise it was more likely to stay inside them and one day turn to guns. At the front of the crowd he watched as Bragg, outweighing his swarthy opponent by forty pounds, got the better of him and finally beat him down into the dust. But that wasn't enough for the white man. When the Mexican, face bleeding badly, struggled to rise, Bragg jerked a knife from his belt. He glared wild-eyed at the Mexican.
In the beat of a heart, Dansing was behind Bragg. The brawler reached for the Mexican's shirt collar with one hand and brought back his knife in the other just as Dansing buffaloed him across the side of the head with the barrel of his Colt. The bigger man wobbled momentarily and tried to turn, but then lost his balance and fell to one knee. He swung his eyes around, looking for his new attacker. Before he could start to get his senses, Dansing kicked the knife out of his hand. When Bragg started to rise he struck him again with the gun. This time Bragg fell forward on his face. He didn't move again.
"Hey!" a voice growled from the front of the crowd. Several white men, miners by their dress, stepped toward Dansing. The big, black-haired man who had spoken, a man with a broken nose and a scar on his cheek, snarled again.
"You dang near kilt ‘im. You didn't have to hit ‘im twicet. You wanna fight, pick one with me!" Alcohol slurred the man's speech, and he swayed on his feet, but Dansing knew he was still dangerous. There were no weapons visible on him but the ones he was born with.
"Why don't you go home and sleep it off, mister?" Dansing's voice was calm, but it rang with authority. "My gun barrel's about worn out on your friend."
"Yeah, well, let's see you get close t' me with that gun," the miner shot back.
"Tyler," one of the man's friends spoke from behind him. "Call it off. That's Dansing. He's a curly wolf. Besides, he's all right, for a lawman."
Dansing didn't take his eyes from Tyler, but silently he thanked the other man for trying.
"The hell he is! He hit ol' Bragg when he barely had the strength t' stand. Come on, Mister John Law. Whoop me, too."
Dansing stood relaxed, but ready to spring in any direction. "Why ‘whoop' you, friend? What's to keep me from using this the way Sam Colt intended? I'm tired of your mouth. Make a move or wander along."
"Why you--"
With a curse, the man charged, and Dansing side-stepped him. He took a swing with the gun barrel as the man stumbled past, but the glancing blow only stung him. Dansing didn't wait for another charge. He stepped in closer as Tyler turned, and with all of his might he kicked, catching the bigger man in the ribs with the side of his boot. It was plain that time the big man was damaged; the sound of at least one cracking rib was like a wolf biting down on a leg bone.
Tyler groaned and grabbed his side, and before he could think about retaliation Dansing kicked him again. This time Tyler was bent slightly over, and the kick caught him in the belly and nearly lifted him off the ground. He landed on his back beside his friend, the air whooshing from his lungs.
Dansing whirled back toward the others. No one had moved.
"All right, boys, who's next? I'm tired of football. Maybe now we can play pin the tail on the jackass or something." Still holding the Colt at his side, Dansing surveyed the small group of miners who had started forward. None of them made a move, but one began to grin, and finally he laughed aloud.
"Hell, Dansing." It was the man who had spoken in his favor. "You got the best of those two, that's shore. Combed Bragg's hair and kicked Tyler's guts right out his ears. I forgot t' tell ‘im about them feet of yers, I guess. Now come on, they was only funnin'. They're jus' full o' coffin varnish. Let us pick ‘em up, an' we'll haul ‘em back t' the shack. You don't have t' take ‘em to the calaboose, do you?"
Dansing gave a slight, crooked smile. "The calabozo's better than the bone orchard. But I think they've just done more penance than any judge in Pima County would have them do. Go ahead. Drag them off and sober them up. Tell them when they come to, if they still want me they'll have to line up. Otherwise, keep them away from the fire water."
The man laughed. "Sure thing, Dansing! I tell you, now--yer a buscadero, just like they say. Whoo-ee!" he yelled. "Now this here's a town with the hair still on!"
Yells of agreement echoed him, and laughter rippled through the crowd as the tension drained away. Most of the onlookers slowly drifted back to their haunts. Several Mexicans had helped their comrade to his feet. Before they could lead him away he pushed them off insistently and turned and looked at Dansing through one good eye. He gave a crooked smile and a nod, then lifted his hand in thanks and limped away with his compadres.
"Por nada." Dansing smiled, mostly to himself. When the crowd had dispersed, Dansing holstered the Peacemaker and continued on his rounds. Later, he returned to his office. He was sleepy, but the night was not yet over, so he drank three cups of coffee and forced himself to stay awake. It wasn't hard, due to the celebration outside. Dogs barked, horses and burros made their racket. Now and then a tree branch scratched against the side of the building as a night breeze stole silently across the rooftops, then through his window, cool against his sweat. Mexican guitars accompanied velvety Spanish songs sung by Mexican lovers, and somewhere a tinny piano banged away. Guns popped now and then like firecrackers--out of celebration rather than violence, Dansing hoped.
He unholstered his .45 Colt and laid it across a sheaf of papers on the desk before him. He pondered the fate of the four bank robbers who had escaped. Had they reached some settlement? Or had they perished in the desert? Would they live to spend their loot? He hoped not.
A thought came to mind, and he reached into a drawer and withdrew a yellowed copy of the Arizona Citizen, dated April 15, 1876. Sheriff Barden, knowing his past and his feelings for the Apache people, kept this issue in the desk just for him. Dansing reread with a bemused smirk an article regarding the long-lasting problems between the white and Mexican populace of southern Arizona and the area's longstanding rulers, the Chiricahua Apaches. It read thus: "The kind of war needed for the Chiricahua Apache is steady, unrelenting, hopeless, and undiscriminating war, slaying men, women and children until every valley and crest and crag and fastness shall send to high heaven the grateful incense of festering and rotting Chiricahuas." Those were harsh words from a land that had seen much violence and bloodshed on both sides. Ironically, the editorial had appeared two months before Geronimo left the reservation again with close to fifty followers and went on the rampage. Then the papers really had something to scream about, and all of them made vain attempts to breathe more fire than the printing he held in his hand.
Unfortunately, Geronimo wasn't the only war-like Apache leader--nor even the most effective. Victorio, Juh, Nana, and a dozen others had long since made the whites and Mexicans dread the sound of their names.
Geronimo's band was still out there, and since less than one month past, so were the others. With any luck, he thought, one of the bands would intercept the four bank robbers before they reached civilization. That would indeed be poetic justice. But he had no reason to believe such would ever come to pass. Fate didn't seem to work that way.
Forcing thoughts of his failure in the desert from his mind, Dansing sat and sank into reverie. He dreamed of walking arm in arm with Janice Hart through the streets of Tucson.
Every jealous eye followed them.

III
Nightmare

Ellis McGaba was a lonely man. A lonely man and an angry one. He had been in Tubac, on his way to see his sweetheart in Nogales, when Sheriff William Barden placed him under arrest and hauled him back in irons to Tucson.
It was true enough that Ellis McGaba was no innocent man. He'd done time for one crime or another and was guilty of other things for which they'd never caught him. Some called him a cabron, a low-bred outlaw, one of the worst insults a man could give. But when Sheriff Barden advised him he was wanted for the murder of a young girl on the outskirts of Tucson, his pleas of innocence were true. He had never killed any girl anywhere.
But it was obvious Barden had him convicted before he even caught up to him. He treated him like a cur, battered him, tied him to his horse and hauled him far away from his little Mexican friend in Nogales. They arrived in Tucson only to have his alibi verified. He had been nowhere near when the girl was killed.
Sheriff Barden turned him loose without an apology or even a courteous word. The old bastardo seemed almost disappointed he couldn't hang him, as if McGaba had done some personal wrong to the man before. Now here he was in this Tucson cantina, late at night, and his novia--his girl--was far away. He was alone, except for several other borrachos even more intoxicated than he was.
He was angry, yes. Almost angry enough to kill old Sheriff Barden or at least hurt him in some lasting way. But he didn't know where the old man lived. He didn't know anything about him, in fact. If he had, he could have burned his house, killed his horse, or maybe even shot his legs out from under him. Anything to pay him for the brutal treatment, to show him he couldn't treat Ellis McGaba like a dog or some other lower life-form than himself.
Ellis McGaba was not a killer. Maybe that was because the opportunity had never presented itself. He had hurt people before, usually when they were defenseless, or at least when he was behind cover. He was a dangerous man, given the chance, but not brave. When the law caught up, the difference between hurting someone and killing them was sure death. That was a chance he didn't like to take. But this didn't keep him from thinking about killing. He'd have liked to strangle Sheriff Barden, or torture him slowly. But he was afraid of failure.
The glow of kerosene lanterns accentuated McGaba's crooked nose. His black eyes, overhung by heavy brows, took on a fiendish glow in the dim light. He sat at his lonely table and tugged off his sombrero, smoothing curly black hair to one side. He fancied himself a stylish dresser, wearing a waist-length red corduroy jacket trimmed in gold braid, black, flare-legged calzoneras-- Mexican trousers with buttons and fancy embroidery down the sides--and a twin holster rig embellished with silver conchos. The holsters sported two pearl handled, nickel-plated Colts. McGaba was a half-breed, his mother Mexican and his father a Scottish immigrant. Both were dead now, killed by the warriors of the giant Mangas Coloradas eighteen years since.
He stood up and swaggered over to the piano. Beside the bench sat a gaboon, a spitoon made of a plug tobacco box filled with sand or sawdust. For a moment, he stood staring at its repulsive contents, and then he added to them, or tried to, with a poorly aimed stream. Abruptly, he sat down sideways on the bench and banged a few mismatched notes until Squires, the bartender yelled at him across the room.
"Hey, McGaba. Cut the racket. We need t' wind down a little in here."
McGaba shot him an indignant glance. "Go to hell."
Squires was a burly man with a blond, handle-bar mustache. He wore suspenders over a long john shirt that accentuated well-developed muscles. His pale eyes narrowed. "Mister, when the old man's gone home, I'm runnin' this place. I know he lets you get away with hell when he's here, but I got no qualms about stompin' you into dust. Now you keep a civil tongue in your head, or out you go--an' not standin' up."
McGaba nodded angrily. There was no doubt the bigger man could and would carry out any threat he made. In a move intended to restore peace, he got up and walked over to the long plank bar, leaning up against it in front of the bartender. He glanced across at the sober side of the bar.
"How's this place treatin' you, Squires?"
"Just fine," replied the bartender. He seemed to soften a little as his eyes returned to the glass he was drying. "What're you doin' back here? I thought you was headed t' Nogales."
"I was. But the sheriff decided I killed somebody, and he arrested me and brought me back."
Squires raised his brows. "Who'd you kill?"
McGaba looked at him sharply, then swung his eyes away. "I didn' kill nobody. That's the problem. Somebody trumped up charges just to play with me, I guess. Hell, I was cleared the minute we got back in town."
"That's too bad." Squires shook his head. "I figgered you'd be with that girl of yers by now. What was her name? Carma, was it?"
"Carmen," corrected McGaba sharply. "Carmen. Yeah, I figured I'd be with her by now, too. That's the problem with this cantina. No women."
Squires grunted. "That's what's right with this place. Keeps things quiet. Most every time a man gets shot or stabbed in one o' them other saloons, it's over some broad I'd not give the time o' day. And what's the point? After one night they're gone t' the next fella."
McGaba chuckled and shrugged. "So what's wrong there? If they hung around all the time you'd get tired of them."
"Nah. I know one in this town I'd not get sick of. Janice Hart. Mort Dansing's woman."
"Ah, yes," agreed McGaba, his thoughts wandering away for a moment. "Now that's a woman. Too bad she's sweet on a lawdog. I never could see why a woman would take to a man who packed a star. Especially a fine woman like that."
With a laugh, Squires waved a hand toward the door. "Why don't you go ask her? I'm sure she'd give you a piece of her mind."
"Hah! I could steal her away from Dansing without trying," McGaba boasted.
Squires chuckled. "Yeah, sure." He placed several clean glasses back under the bar and looked out of the corners of his eyes at McGaba. "You'd have t' bound an' gag her t' steal her away. She's hooked pretty tight, I'd bet. Besides, what would she see in a drunk like you?"
"Mucho hombre," said McGaba proudly. "I reckon she'd see what a man's supposed to be."
At this boast, Squires had a long laugh, wiping his eyes with the damp dish towel. He ran his fingers along the curled ends of his mustache, looking shrewdly at the half-breed. "You really don't get it, do you? Women just ain't after what men are. Especially not a lady like that. Like I said, you see her at the dress shop tomorrow, you ask her. She'll maybe clue you in what she thinks a real man t' be. An' I'd bet this saloon it ain't you."
"Well it sure ain't you!" McGaba retorted.
"That's right," said Squires calmly. "It's Mort Dansing."
Ellis McGaba stood up straighter and squared his shoulders, sticking his lower lip out. "Well, hell with tomorrow. Maybe I'll just go over tonight and show that woman what she's missing."
Again, Squires laughed with glee, slapping a big hand hard on the bar. "You need t' go sober up somewhere, I say! Go belch off some o' that aguardiente," he chuckled. "You show up t' her door tonight she's liable t' think somebody brung the whole damn brewery over."
"Aw, shut up."
Squires straightened to his full six-foot-two, squaring his broad shoulders. He placed the glass and towel he had been holding on top of the bar. "Now that's enough of yer mouth, boy. Go on an' skedaddle outta here. Before I bust yer tail. I warned you once."
"Aw, go t' hell," McGaba growled.
Squires came across the bar with such swiftness the inebriated McGaba had no time to react. He grabbed the half-breed around the throat with his left hand and slammed him on top of the head with the bottom of his fist so hard McGaba's knees buckled. Squires let him hit the sawdust, then heaved him up by the lapels of his fancy jacket and walked him backwards to the open doorway, shoving him out into the street.
McGaba almost fell again but managed to catch his balance against an awning post. For several seconds he stood dazed, shaking his head to clear it. His hazy vision came into focus, and he whirled from the post toward the door. The doorway was empty. Squires had returned to the bar, probably to pick up the shotgun he kept hidden beneath it. McGaba turned away, not drunk enough to try and reenter the bar. Squires had a fast, hot temper. When it cooled, he could return. Maybe he really had drunk too much, as Squires seemed to think.
Walking away from the cantina, Ellis McGaba almost stumbled into a signpost at the corner of the street. He backed up to see the sign better and peered at it in the darkness. At last he made out the markings. CONGRESS ST--Calle de la Alegria. He stood silently for a moment, his muddled thoughts churning. Congress Street. Congress. Why did that ring such a sharp bell?
Then it came to him. On Congress Street was the cottage of the widow, Janice Hart.
Sudden base imaginings caused his blood to pump faster. What a beauty the widow was! Too bad she was taken. But then, was she really? He had boasted to Squires he could steal her from Dansing. Was that such an empty boast? Maybe she really wasn't spoken for at all. There was nothing written in stone, only town gossip.
Sweat began to trickle down McGaba's neck just thinking of the widow falling to his advances. He had a vivid imagination, and he put it to use now. The best part of all was the thought of stealing her from Mort Dansing, a lawman. A deputy of William Barden, to boot! At last, here was a way he could get at Barden. Indirectly, of course, but it was better than nothing.
McGaba chuckled. The whisky made him brazen. He just had to try. He had to see, at least, how close he could come. Oh, to throw the love of Janice Hart in Squires' face. Then he would surely get some respect. He smiled and turned up Congress Street.
In two blocks, he was at her gate. The house was dark. Judging by the stars, it was at least two o'clock in the morning. But he could see the front door in the moonlight. The house was surrounded by grape vines entangled along a picket fence and over a lattice panel that ran the full length of the front yard, forming a cozy arbor. The place showed the care of a woman's touch.
McGaba hesitated just inside the gate, out of view from the street. He watched the quiet residence, his heart beating wildly. He imagined Janice Hart's ivory skin, her black hair and gentle eyes. He pictured those eyes looking at him full of wanting. He stood there building himself up. He started forward numerous times--he couldn't even count the number. Then he would draw back to the shelter of the arbor again and stand hidden, his mind going crazy with thoughts of the beauty inside. Always his mind clutched the notion that in some obscure way this would make Sheriff Barden pay for his unjust arrest and brutal treatment. Even if Barden didn't care, Dansing was a lawman, too, and no lawman deserved any consideration whatsoever from him. They had never given him any, so he would repay in kind.
He stood there in the shadows for almost an hour. Finally, he took a deep breath and started up the walk.

Hank the liveryman yawned and stretched and took a pull from a silver flask. He'd been up two hours now, since five o'clock, and was on his fifth cup of coffee--and his first pint of whisky. He wouldn't drink much of the latter, but his muscles were stiff, and a sip or two would ease them and his calcified bones.
He leaned on his pitchfork and looked outside. He had three more stalls to clean, and then he could take a break and maybe read some of the Arizona Citizen he'd bought the day before. He would wait till the afternoon, after siesta, to replace the straw in the stalls. It wasn't good to work all day.
Wiping sweat from his forehead with the sleeve of a once-white shirt, he moved to the next stall. He stopped abruptly. A man lay asleep in the moldy straw. The first thing Hank noticed was the brown stains on his hands. It appeared he'd been in some kind of fight the night before--the stains looked suspiciously like dried blood.
Hank booted the man in the hip with his toe. "Hey, mister. Get up. Rise an' shine." The man didn't move. "Hey, get up," Hank repeated with a smirk. "Get up or I'll rifle yer pockets an' take out my rent. It's a dollar a night to sleep in here." This wasn't true, but it sounded good. The man was obviously too far gone to hear anyway.
Finally, the sleeping one began to stir. When his eyes opened, they opened wide, and he stared for a moment at the ceiling, as if getting his bearings. It was Ellis McGaba. He sat up quickly and grabbed his head in his hands.
"All right, mister. What's the deal?" asked Hank. "You got a horse in here, or you stayin' at my expense?"
McGaba lowered his hands. "Where am I? What time is it?"
Hank looked around, then back at the half-breed. "You're in Johnson's Livery Barn's where you are. An' I guess it's after seven by now. Now what about my question? Got a horse in here?"
McGaba sat in the soiled hay, closing his eyes tightly and opening them several times to bring them into focus. "Uh, sure," he said, avoiding the hostler's eyes. He stood up shakily and steadied himself by placing a hand on the top board of the stall.
"What horse?" queried Hank mistrustfully. "I don't remember you comin' in, an' I don't gen'rally forget a face."
McGaba swayed on his feet and put a hand to his eyes again. In better light, Hank was convinced it was blood on the man's hands, and a lot of it. Peering closer, he saw four long scratches down his cheek.
"You all right, mister? Looks like you got in a fight with some hellcat an' lost."
McGaba looked down at his hands. He dropped them to his sides, looking around, wild-eyed. He leaned down and snatched up his sombrero, clamping it on his head in one motion, then taking a hold of the stall again when dizziness overcame him. He shook his head and looked over at Hank. "What time did you say it is?"
"Seven, I said. Mister, if you're in some kinda trouble. . . . You better just leave now. I can't afford t' have someone come lookin' for yuh in here. You really got a horse here, you best get it and skedaddle."
"You got a good horse I c'n rent?" the half-breed asked. "I'll pay three days rent in advance."
"I got a feelin' you won't be back this way, mister. What'll you leave for security?"
The man thought a moment, then put a hand on the Colt in his left holster. "How ‘bout this Colt? Cost me twenty-eight dollars new."
"Let me see it," said Hank. "But I ain't promisin'."
McGaba started to lift the gun slowly out of its holster. Then suddenly it was in mid-air and planted against Hank's skull. With a cry of surprise and pain, he fell to his hands and knees, then felt another blow across the back of the skull. He fell over on the dirt floor, and the air seeped from his open mouth. He was half aware of McGaba running down the length of the stable.
McGaba quickly threw a bridle on an old strawberry roan which lazed in the last stall. This he followed with a well-worn McClellan saddle across its broad back. Within five minutes he was riding away through the desert toward the Sierra Tucson--the Tucson Mountains.

There was an insistent knocking at Mort Dansing's front door. The last several raps awakened him, and he lay there wishing the visitor away. Couldn't they ever let him sleep? Again the knock came, this time even louder, and a female voice cried out his name.
"Just a minute," he called. He sat up and looked around, bleary-eyed, for his shirt and hat. He put them on, then his knee-high boots. He glanced briefly at his watch and swore. It was nine o'clock in the morning, and he hadn't even gone to sleep till four. Five hours of sleep wasn't so bad, but he hadn't yet made up for the two or three hours they had roused him out of the morning of the bank robbery.
He stumbled to the door and opened it. He recognized Maude Garrett, who owned the dress shop where Janice Hart worked. He was puzzled for a second. He didn't catch the look in her eyes and couldn't even make a guess why she would come to his house so early of a morning. It wasn't until he looked down the street and saw Sheriff William Barden striding their way that alarm first gripped him.
He looked back at Maude. She was a woman of fifty-odd years, with a hard way of looking at men through frigid blue eyes. But right now her eyes weren't hard. They were wide and scared, her eyelids swollen. She started to put her hand out toward him, whispering his name in a cracking voice, and he took her hand in his.
"Maude, what's wrong?" His voice sound as calm as he'd tried to make it.
"Oh, Mort," Maude cried suddenly, and she fell into his arms, sobbing. She repeated his name over and over into his shirt. He had never imagined Maude Garrett breaking down this way, and it sent arrows of fear through his heart.
He looked up and saw Sheriff Barden only fifty yards away, and he took Maude by the shoulders and held her away from him. "What's wrong, Maude? Tell me now."
"Jan is dead, Mort. Someone killed her!" She fell to sobbing uncontrollably, clutching his his shoulders.
Sheriff Barden came to a halt several yards away. Dansing knew that was in deference to Maude Garrett, not to him. He stood and watched the scene in Dansing's doorway.
A cold emptiness clutched Dansing's insides. He froze, holding Maude's shoulders in a crushing grip. He stared into the street, not seeing it, not seeing anything. Only the haunting face of Janice Hart appeared before him, eyes beseeching, parted lips silent.
Suddenly, he threw his arms around the woman, crushing her to him. He let her cry against him and didn't move, and at last Sheriff Barden turned away and stood looking down the street.
Maude finally stepped away, and Mort Dansing would never forget the compassionate glow in her eyes when she looked up at him. Those eyes would never appear the same to him. He thanked her silently for coming, then turned to Barden.
Somehow the sheriff seemed to sense the change in the atmosphere, and he turned back toward them and came closer. He was a hard-looking man with a pinched face and cruel eyes. He wore a tiny mustache over tightly pressed lips. He and Dansing had never gotten along. The only reason Dansing even kept a job in Pima County was his uncanny ability to follow a trail, judge men, and speak fluently in both Chiricahua and Spanish. There were many men in the west who used guns well, and if not for Dansing's other abilities, he knew Barden would long since have shipped him "down the road." But as much as the two disliked each other, Barden understood the use of tact, and even this bitter old man knew the moment called for it.
"I guess you heard," he said with forced softness. "My condolences, Dansing. I know you two were close." From the man who hated Apaches with every strand of his being and detested anyone sympathetic to them in any way, that was far more compassion than Mort Dansing had expected.
Dansing looked over at Maude, who stood watching him. He reached over and squeezed her hand. "Thanks, Maude. Thanks for coming."
Understanding that this was her cue to depart, the woman smiled and wiped at her eyes with a handkerchief, then turned and made her slow way back up the street. Dansing turned back to Barden.
"Who did it?" His voice was guarded.
Sheriff Barden searched his face. Then he dropped his eyes. "I think it was Ellis McGaba."
Dansing was stunned, but his face remained a mask. Ellis McGaba! Ellis McGaba, whom Barden had brought back from Tubac on a badly-researched murder warrant. The story was all around town now. Ellis McGaba. If not for Barden, the man would probably have been far away in Mexico by now.
Dansing had to avert his eyes from the old man and wait for his emotions to ebb. Had he looked at him, he was afraid he'd have back-handed him. But he couldn't let base instincts take over. He had to control himself at all times. That was a trait of all good Apache warriors. Such he had learned at a young age.
They looked up simultaneously, and their eyes met. "There's a posse gathering, Dansing. I want you to know from the start, I don't want you there. The chances you'll hurt this posse are extreme, because you'll be reckless. But I need you." It seemed to twist the old man's guts to admit that, and he bit off the words, making no attempt to hide the sour look on his face. "I need your tracking eye and maybe your Apache tongue. They tell me several bands of murdering Injuns are off the reservation now. Geronimo's and Victorio's--some others. So you'd better come along."
Dansing stared at Barden, his eyes flat. "Well, it's good you decided that. One way or another, I'll go. And for the record, I'm not reckless. I had better teachers than that."
Without another word, he turned into his house and shut the door, leaving Sheriff Barden standing alone.
Fifteen minutes later, he walked into Janice Hart's house. The mayor and two councilmen were standing in the shade outside, and a young parttime deputy by the name of Sibbles was in the widow's room, staring at the scene in quiet shock. Dansing stopped across from Sibbles.
"Can you give me a moment? And please shut the door when you go."
Sibbles obeyed, stepping outside. Dansing looked down at the white, blood-stained sheet that concealed Janice Hart's body from his view. He ran his hand down his mustache, resting his thumb and forefinger on his chin. He chewed his mustache and stared at the still form. Only one thing could ever convince him his friend was actually gone, and that was what tore his heart out of his chest. He had to see her one last time.
Kneeling beside her head, he eased back a corner of the sheet. Lifeless green eyes stared at the ceiling. A wisp of black hair lay across the ivory-skinned forehead. Pale lips he had dreamed of kissing were parted, as if gasping for a final breath that wouldn't come.
His heart thudding dully, he reached beneath the sheet and took her cold hand. He held it and stared at her lips, avoiding her pleading eyes. He would not cry. As an Apache, he knew self control. A man did not cry. An Apache had to be used to the death of loved ones, for death seemed to follow an Apache camp like the plague.
"I'm sorry, Janice. What could I have done?"
And then he forgot he was a man. The tears came, coursing down his whiskered cheeks, and he sobbed out loud, kneeling beside Janice Hart like a little lost boy. At last, he leaned slowly, and his lips touched her cold mouth, only briefly. He straightened back up, still holding her hand.
"There'll never be another like you, Janice. You might as well take my heart and keep it where you are. But know this: I'll ride Ellis McGaba into the ground and treat him the way of an Apache warrior. Don't dare go into your grave thinking you're unavenged."

IV
To Fight or Flee

At times, the posse rode single file, when the brasada was too tangled to do otherwise. In the Sierra Tucson, the killer's tracks led them into the same pass through which the bank robbers had fled. Dansing cursed Grant's stock trail. It was bad luck for him.
When they crossed the trail's summit they left sight of Tucson behind. It was an eerie feeling, as if a one way door had just closed behind them through which they could never return. And ahead was a Chiricahua-ridden hell.
They wound painstakingly down through the cactus and rock of the Tucson Mountains, down into Avra Valley. Ellis McGaba's tracks stretched before them across the desert, trickling toward rows of jagged, hazy blue mountains. The valley had been heavily over-grazed by cattle, leaving scant bunchgrass among the inedible plants. This made the trail visible at times to even the most inept of trackers. Mort Dansing rode and said nothing. He studied the land and tried to plan a defense if caught in the open by Apaches.
He fought down a gathering gloom inside. Janice Hart was dead, and he had to avenge her. But could he? Or would he die in the attempt? He had lived with Apaches, but he knew he could expect no mercy. Apaches fought other Apaches. Western Apaches, Mescaleros, Jicarillas, even Chiricahuas scouted for the army. They tracked down their own people--sometimes their own brothers. They were a wandering people, and most of them didn't know each other, anyway. They never had. Others had changed loyalties, and for the money or whatever other reason, they now worked for their traditional enemy, the Army. So often there was little loyalty, even among members of the same clan and language. Dansing, a white man raised by Apaches but returned to his white roots could expect no mercy.
They hadn't made it twenty miles from town when Dansing drew Gent in abruptly at sight of a massive turmoil of tracks crossing the trail before them. He sat the grullo quietly and waited for the others to catch up. There were ten men in the posse, and finally the last one drifted to an awe-struck halt beside him.
The highway of tracks cut a swathe so wide and deeply etched Dansing guessed a hundred people or more had passed here. Many of the tracks were of horses, but not all of them. Some were made by people, and those people, for the most part, wore moccasins.
Sheriff Barden sat to Dansing's left, his face oddly pale. He stared down at the tracks but didn't ask for an interpretation. No one asked.
Dansing made his face a mask. He avoided meeting anyone else's eyes but was acutely aware of theirs flickering from one another's to his. Did they think he could help them? He had lived with Apaches, so these men thought he still held some sway with them. Well, let them think that. Maybe he could use it to his advantage. He needed the posse now. There was safety in numbers, and he needed the escort. He had to find Ellis McGaba.
Barden suddenly cleared his throat. "How old is this trail, Dansing?"
Dansing sat still a moment longer until the question finally registered. He swung his eyes, then, and almost let them light on the sheriff. At the last moment they continued on past and rested on the Waterman Mountains ahead.
"Well, they're older than McGaba's. A day, I'd guess. No more."
William Barden scratched his jaw and looked around him, affectedly studious of the mountains locking them into this valley. "How many, do you think?"
Dansing instantly shrugged, raising his hands to the sides. "Seventy-five, maybe. Could be a hundred or more. Too many to count, and that's the fact. If it makes a difference to you, there are some children and women in the group. But they're all warlike now. The truly peaceable ones wouldn't leave San Carlos even when they're dying there."
Barden scoffed. "You don't have tell me about the warlike ones. I'd kill them all, just like they would me if they had the chance."
Dansing looked quickly away, his jaw muscles hardening. Barden wasn't just talking to talk. He really would kill them all--old, young, sick; women, children, and babies. It didn't matter. He had proved that at Camp Grant in seventy-one. That April day he and over a hundred followers-- whites, Mexicans and Papago Indians--had attacked a peaceful encampment of Arivaipa Apaches near Camp Grant. They attacked while the warriors were out on a hunting foray.
They killed everyone they could--eight old men and close to a hundred women and children. They were so thorough they chased down the wounded and lame and bludgeoned them with clubs and rocks. Only a few of the swift and fortunate escaped alive, along with thirty children whom the Papagos took as captives.
Then the attackers went about hacking apart the bodies, taking ears, fingers, noses, and other body parts for souvenirs. Barden had described the incident as a "memorable and glorious morning." And in Tucson he had been branded a hero. Although brought up on charges of murder at President Grant's insistence, Barden and all of his cohorts were acquitted after nineteen minutes of deliberation by the jury.
Dansing could hardly think of the massacre without the driving desire to put a knife between the old man's ribs. It was a hell of a thing to have to follow the orders of a man filled with so much hate for a people he loved.
Dan Hough was with the posse, and when no one else spoke for a time he broke the silence. "Mort? You won't turn back, will you?" By the tone of the young man's voice, it almost sounded like he hoped they would.
Dansing's eyes jumped to the young man and scanned his face. He was surprised to imagine Hough would want to turn back. He thought too much of Janice Hart. But it was plain the boy was worried about what lay ahead. That was only natural.
Dansing slowly turned to take in William Barden's pinched face. Their eyes met and held. "I'm going on. We don't have any hundred and eight men, but maybe a heap more repeaters than they had in seventy-one."
Ostensibly, he was answering Hough's query. But the words were meant for Barden. Everyone who knew anything about the sheriff's past would realize he was referring to the Camp Grant Massacre.
Barden's eyes hardened like bits of stone, and a corner of his mouth twitched. He stared at Dansing until the deputy looked away, wishing he hadn't locked eyes with the old man. He wasn't interested in a staring contest. Maybe a killing contest, but not staring.
They made the foothills at dusk, and McGaba's horse tracks in the dim light were a mere suggestion in the soil. The killer had ridden in the Apaches' tracks to this point, possibly to throw any pursuit off his trail. But here the Apache band continued on into the foothills, and McGaba turned north along their base. His tracks pointed toward the distant bulk of Picacho Peak, whose highest crags trapped the last of the sun's rays and turned gold in the fading day.
When Barden called for a camp, Dansing didn't fight it. The trail now was dim, and he wanted to take no chance on losing it. Besides, only a complete fool would attempt to travel this roadless, broken stretch in the dark.
He staked Gent out near a paloverde tree and walked off by himself to stare in the direction McGaba had gone. When Dansing looked down at McGaba's tracks, his mind couldn't help turning to the last trail he had followed, and lost. The trail of the four bank robbers, covered by swirling dust and sand. But he could afford that loss. Those men were only bank robbers, not the killers of his dearest friend.
Apprehensively, he turned his eyes toward the sky. Not a cloud there. Even now, with the sunlight melted from the height of Picacho Peak, he made out the bold diamond of Venus and two or three pinpricks of stars. A clear night.
I'll need those tracks come morning. Please let it stay that way, he prayed silently.
The camp was a dry one. The horses and posse drank sparingly from water the packhorses had carried from Tucson. They didn't risk a fire. While the horses munched on grain, their riders chewed on dried beef and hardtack and two biscuits apiece. The Apaches might well be concealed in the mountains to the west. Being cold and eating cold food was preferable to other options. . . .
Dansing rolled out his bedroll on the far side of the paloverde where Gent nibbled at the few shriveled blades of available grass. Soon he heard another horse stepping near, and then boot heels crunched in gravel at his side. "Mind if I stretch my cama down with yers?"
Dansing looked up at Dan Hough and forced a smile, glancing down at the bedroll in his hand. "Sure, Dan." He would rather have been alone, but he had a soft spot for the young man. Besides, with Leigh staying in Tucson this trip, Hough was his only friend here. And friends had to stick together.
Hough spread his bedroll and sat on a rock to tug off his boots. He had dropped the first one nearby, but the second one he held onto and stared into its depths as if searching for some secret message. Dansing watched him for a while, then worked his own boots off and sat down cross- legged on his blankets.
"Long day, huh, Dan?"
Startled, Hough glanced over at him. He tried to smile, but it was even more pathetic than Dansing's attempt. He looked back down at his boot, then set it aside with a sigh. "It's been a damn long day, Mort. The longest I c'n remember." He stared at his hands for long seconds, then suddenly swore, his voice bitter, and pressed his lips together.
Dansing looked at Hough for a while, then tugged off his sweat-stained black hat and scratched the back of his head thoughtfully until it dawned on him it hadn't even itched in the first place. He returned his gaze to the cowboy.
"What's on your mind?"
Hough's eyes remained lowered for a second, then at last turned to Dansing, squinting against the darkness, or against. . . tears? Dansing wondered. He'd had the urge himself, off and on all day. But damn the male animal. They all had to be so tough and not let another man--or more especially a woman--see them shed tears. Once a man did that, he could never be strong again.
"I reckon I was thinkin' about Jan-- About Mrs. Hart."
Dansing bit his lip and lowered his eyes. His bedroll was fading into the gray of the sand. A nighthawk cried overhead. Keek, keek, keek. He let his eyes sweep the pink-tinted western sky as the narrow, white-spotted wings of the bird wheeled it through its plummetings. He could hear the rest of the posse speaking in muffled tones where they had bedded down thirty or forty yards away from him. They couldn't be seen sleeping near an Indian lover. Especially an Apache lover.
His mind slipped back against his will to what Dan had said. "Mrs. Hart." Hearing her name had almost broken the spell. It had made his throat catch and tighten. The dark-haired beauty wove through his tangled thoughts once more. He didn't know if he wanted to talk. He didn't know if he could. But he knew Dan needed to, and Dan was his friend.
"She was a fine woman. A mighty fine lady."
Hough smiled. It was a sad smile, the kind that melancoly memories make. Dansing was no mind reader, but he'd sensed the same smile on his own face a time or two that day.
How well did Dan know Janice, anyway? He wished he knew. He wished somehow he could get inside the young man's head, feel what he felt. Were his feelings the same ones of utter emptiness that throbbed in Dansing? Now he did have the sudden urge to talk--to talk to someone who felt like he did. Dan just might. He had talked often with Janice, and often of her. She was a friend to them both. They should be able to help each other through the grief.
Hough was nodding, as if to himself. He spoke softly, without looking up at Dansing. "She was the nicest woman I ever met. And the pertiest. You know, most perty women know they can have their choice of men, an' they hardly give most men the time o' day. But not Janice. Not. . . her." Hough's voice had caught. Now he waited in silence for half a minute. "She never had a mean word for nobody. Not even them that talked bad about her. Why-- Why her, Mort? Do you think. . . ." He shook his head with a derisive laugh.
Dansing just watched him, waiting.
Hough looked at him and swung his gaze away several times before finally meeting his friend's eyes. "Do you think maybe God wanted her with him?"
His eyes fixed on Hough's, Dansing couldn't speak for a moment past the lump in his throat. At last, he muttered quietly, "Would you blame him, Dan?"
Before Hough could make any reply, footsteps crackled in the brush behind them, and one of the posse members stopped between the two of them and hunkered down. Dansing recognized Aaron Bragg, whom he had buffaloed in the brawl the night before. He wore an ugly purple bruise across the side of his face.
"Thought I heard you boys mention the Widda Hart," said Bragg. He seemed to have forgotten his anger at Dansing, or at least hid it well.
Irritated at the uninvited intrusion, Dansing merely grunted. Hough was kinder.
"Did you know ‘er?"
"Just a little. Least she said hello every time I seen her." He interlaced his fingers and stared down at them for a moment before he spoke again. "Let me know if I'm steppin' on yer toes, Dansing, but. . . I always wondered if a man could get anywhere with that woman. I heard someone at the mine say she was a whore back in New Orleans. Did you ever. . . ."
Bragg never had time to finish his thought as Dansing and Hough leaped to their feet.
"What the hell did you just say?" Hough spat the words like bullets. "Get up."
Bragg complied, holding up his hands as if to ward the younger man off. "Don't get all het up, boy. I'm just repeatin' what someone said down at the mine. I was just curious what she was like. Hell, boy, any woman c'n be a whore, one time or another."
"I guess that includes yer mother."
Dansing saw the miner's face darken. "All right, boy, there's no call--" The words seemed to suddenly strike home to Bragg, along with the realization that he was not only the bigger of the two, but probably the more experienced fighter. "I'm gonna kill you for what you said."
Dansing stepped between them, facing Bragg. He spoke over his shoulder to his young friend. "Sit down and cool off, Dan."
"But--" There was desperation in the voice.
"Just sit down."
"I'll have his hide," Bragg growled to Dansing. "Let me past you, an' I'll finish this. You don't need to break in on our business."
Dansing's eyes narrowed. "I broke in because it's my business, friend. Your mouth's a loose cannon, and it needs to be plugged. Once and for all. You can say any damn thing you please about your women in the Wedge, but you go throwing loose words around about my friend, I'll tear you apart. You sound like some old woman gossip. Have some respect for the dead."
"Or what?" Bragg spat.
"Or I'll see you join them."
A crowd of the others was starting to form behind Bragg when Sheriff Barden broke through, ramming his shoulders against the others to make his path. "Get out of the way," he growled, stopping beside Bragg. "What goes on here?"
No one replied for a moment, so Barden spoke again. "Damn you, Dansing. Everywhere you go there's trouble. What's it about this time? Why don't you move off farther from the rest? I thought you liked to be alone."
Dansing's eyes hardened. He had felt his anger start to melt like sun-heated honey through a sieve. But William Barden had the uncanny ability to freeze it up again.
"Be careful where you jump. I'm in no mood to be jumped on tonight."
"The hell--you--say." Barden bit off each word in his derogatory tone. "Well, mister, I'll jump where I feel the need. I don't even care what happened. It involves you, and that's enough for me. You'll stand first watch." The sheriff's eyes flashed toward Hough. "You and the cowboy. I'll come for you when your time's up."
Before Dansing responded, he had the sudden feeling he had better take Barden to the side before this went any further. Letting their anger build in front of an audience was only hurting their ultimate purpose. "Can we talk out of earshot?"
Barden had set his jaw, and he raised his fists to rest on his hips. "Anything that needs to be said can be said here."
In his thoughts, Dansing used terms against the sheriff that seldom escaped his lips. But he had to admit they made him feel better when they did. "All right, old man. You want it said here, then you'll have it. I don't like being talked to like some school kid. And I don't stand watch. I can't stand watch and then get up early and be expected to keep the trail. You should be the first to know that, being the big Indian killer. Find someone else."
The sheriff's mouth dropped open, and for a moment he let his eyes skitter about the gathered group. A reply was a long time coming. And in the meantime not a word was spoken, even whispered.
"You," Barden spat the word at Hough. "Get up in the rocks and stand first watch, and I mean now. And Bragg, you get out there too. And you. . . ." He turned his eyes back on Dansing. "I don't need you. There are others in this group that can track; we haven't seen a track all day I couldn't follow myself."
Dansing had tried to stem his anger, but it was like a dam bursting inside, and he had no control over what spilled forth. He heard the words come out of his mouth as if someone else spoke them.
"You're full of crap, old man. Without me you'd be chasing your tail, and everyone here knows it. If you're lucky, you'll just get lost. Otherwise, you'll get killed. And I can't say I'd be sorry, either, but I can say one thing: I'll be there when Janice Hart's killer is run to the ground. I can't say the same for you."
Mort Dansing might as well have thrown his badge at Sheriff Barden's feet. There was no further question of his being employed by Pima County in any capacity. The ashes of the proverbial bridge had washed downstream.
Dansing waited, and felt the others waiting, for Barden to respond, but he never did. He turned on his heel and marched back to his bedroll on the far side of camp. The horses returned their attention to cropping anything that could remotely be considered nourishment. The rest of the posse just stood, looking at one another like they didn't dare move for fear of breaking a spell. A few of them snickered, but not loud enough for the sheriff to hear. At last, they drifted quietly back toward their blankets, averting their eyes from Sheriff Barden.
Initially surprised by Barden's lack of response, Dansing stood near his cama and let the tension melt out of him. It took a few minutes for the quiver to go out of his legs. He looked around and was surprised to realize Hough had taken his rifle up into the rocks.
No longer sleepy, after the disturbance, he tugged his own flat-heeled boots back on, then picked up his Winchester and strode up through the dimly lit rocks to where Hough had stationed himself. It had grown dark now, and stars sprinkled the sky like distant pools of water across an endless violet prairie. Hough's blue shirt was silhouetted against a moon-dusted rock. Dansing stopped before him.
"Your shirt's too dark to stand here, Dan," he advised. "Find a dark spot of dirt, or a tree. An Apache would kill you here."
Hough was quiet for a moment, perhaps unsure what to make of the recaptured calmness in Dansing's voice. His own was shaky when he replied. "I thought Apaches never fought after dark."
"Most don't. The nighttime is sacred to their ancestral dead, and they have a fear they would wander forever in darkness if they died at night. But that's like saying all cowboys drink whisky and visit the brothel. Many do--but would you bet your life on all of them? Apaches are true to their religion, as a rule. But there's always an oddball, and they kill just as cleanly."
Hough nodded but didn't speak.
"I don't mean to treat you like a kid, Dan. But everybody has to learn somehow. I wasn't born knowing these things. If I offend you I'm sorry, but you're like the eye of the storm in this posse. I'd sort of like to keep you alive."
Dansing saw Hough's teeth flash in a quick smile. "Thanks, Mort. I'll listen to anything you say."
"All right. Then one more thing. I didn't hear you chamber a round in your rifle. Did you?"
"Well, no--"
"Do it now. Then let your hammer down. You need to draw a bead on some Apache later, having to just click back a hammer is a lot less noisy than working that lever. That could mean the difference between living and dying."
Hough complied, then looked back up at Dansing expectantly. Dansing clapped a hand to his shoulder and squeezed. "Janice Hart was no prostitute, Dan. I'd stake my life on it."
Hough's biggest smile of the day was his only response.

When morning came, Dansing saw the Apache.
He stood three hundred yards away on a rock outcrop, watching the camp in the curious way of a big, self-assured cat. He knew the posse spotted him. He obviously wanted them to. He stood there in the halflight and stared at them as if daring them to come after him, to shoot at him. To try anything.
The man was too far away for them to see his eyes, but surrounding them, down to mid- cheek and back to his ears, was a mask of black paint. His long hair and the tails of the red bandanna which secured it fluttered against his neck when the breeze came up. His loose shirttail flapped, and the worn barrel of his rifle picked up the alpenglow of the dawn.
Dansing watched the Indian for some time before one of the others noticed him and pointed excitedly. "Sheriff! There's a damn Injun up there watchin' us!"
"The ‘damn Injuns'," muttered Dansing with a wry smile. "Certainly the most prolific tribe of all."
Barden hurried over and stood squinting up the slope. Now that the others had seen the Apache too, Dansing pulled out his field glasses and studied the man intently.
"What's he doing out there by himself?" Barden looked over at Dansing. "Is he suicidal, or what?"
A faint smile touched Dansing's lips, and he lowered the glasses and handed them to the sheriff. "He's hardly alone. Look below him, in the lee of those rocks."
Barden took the glasses and stared toward the Apache. He looked for half a minute, then at last began to move his lips, silently at first. "Okay. I see him now. There's another one just below him, in front of that bush." A curse whispered past his lips. "My eyes aren't what they once were."
Dansing nodded and took back the glasses. "There's three more below him besides the one you spotted. All of them have Winchesters."
"Do you think there's only the five of them?"
"I couldn't say." Dansing shrugged. "Could be a rear guard for the bunch we've been following. Could be they spotted us coming yesterday and sent the scouts down for an early reception."
"Yes, it could be about anything, couldn't it? I could have told you that much myself, and I'm no Injun."
Dansing brushed the comment off. He wasn't in the mood for petty insults this morning--not for receiving them nor even for giving them. He was still waiting to see if Barden would bring up the previous night's verbal altercation. His bet was no. Before the appearance of the Apaches, perhaps, but not now. Barden wouldn't dare send him away from the posse when he might be their only chance to leave these hills alive.
Barden squinted toward the Apache on the rock. Dansing looked back and forth from Barden to the Apache. I wish I could get inside your head, old man. What'll it be today? Justice? Or tail- between-the-legs retreat?
As for Dansing, what choice did he have? Alone, he could have gone undetected and probably found McGaba, then at least killed him, if not brought him back for trial. His Apache upbringing argued for that route. Now that the Apaches had spotted them, he could never sneak away without being seen--at least not on the grullo. He could always go on afoot, but he would rather not. The only other chance was for the Apaches to be overawed by the sheer numbers of the posse. But he had the feeling the Indians' roll call would be the more intimidating of the two.
"I guess we'd better make some quick choices here, boys," spoke Barden, his eyes narrowed and watching the Apaches. "Do we shoot them and go on, or do we turn tail and run? I've never run from an Apache before."
"Well, if you're going to shoot, you'd best get to it," replied Dansing. "And I hope you're good." He was looking toward the Apache, but farther up the slope, where broken granite outcrops jutted up stubbornly out of the paloverde and mesquite.
Barden turned and followed the line of his gaze to a deep swale in the hillside which suddenly began to spew forth mounted Apaches. And though the old man's eyes weren't good, it was hard not to see the Apaches, by the sheer bulk of their numbers and the light tan rock against which they were silhouetted.
There were thirty Apaches if there was one, and the majority of them carried Winchesters. With the eyes of hungry but patient predators, they watched the posse. . . and waited.

back to the Books page