“El Tigre wants you,” Sundance said, and watched him hurry away in the company of the two Apaches. Sight of the man’s arrogant walk was almost as sickening as having to listen to his braggadocio.

  Sundance smiled coldly. Hunter might have other plans, but Sundance had no intention of leaving him behind to await noon tomorrow and the fight with knives.

  On his brief inspection trip to the north of camp, he had verified the fact that there was a second trail. He had seen two braves riding it from below. It was the route Sundance would take tonight in the dark of the moon.

  Sundance hunted for the Apache girl and Lila Corey. He saw neither one. Time was running out. It was important that he win Lila’s confidence. White clouds in the dry mountain air boiled about higher peaks to the north, and pulled into strange shapes by turbulence.

  At last he found the girl, seated dejectedly on a flat rock. A squaw had finished rinsing soap from the long pale hair by sloshing water over the bent head. Sundance waited until the squaw had departed for more water, leather bucket thumping against a skirted leg, before approaching the girl.

  “You’re Sundance,” she said, pushing aside the damp hair. “Moon Star has talked about you.” Lila swallowed. “The washing of the hair ... I’m being prepared for my new master.”

  “You’ll have no new master.” But she seemed not to hear him.

  “Big Luke. I’ve seen him here in camp. His stare always turns me cold.” She shuddered.

  Sundance squatted beside a towering rock, one eye on the squaws and braves moving toward cook fires or horse herd.

  “Lila, listen to me. Is Moon Star the Apache girl you were with?”

  But again the girl seemed not to hear what he was saying. Her light gray eyes reflected bitterness. “You want to know how I met that terrible person— Hunter.” Sundance started to interrupt, but it all boiled within her. He decided to let her talk. She told how her father found life confining on their ranch at Whipple Creek, and wanted to take up land near the Rockies.

  She choked up. “Oh, if he had only stayed. We had friends. Whipple Creek is the longest we stayed anyplace since my mother died. He was so ... so restless.”

  “Why haven’t your relatives worried about you? Or your friends?”

  She said she had no relatives, and the friends they had made at Whipple Creek didn’t expect word from them for months. She spoke of how their wagon was overloaded. “I sensed it was from the start. I think Dad knew it, but he wouldn’t discard anything. We got mired in quicksand. When he tried to dig us out, he ... he just fell over.”

  “And then Hunter happened along.”

  “I heard a horse. I was so distraught that I grabbed a rifle, thinking it was an Indian.” She looked at him. “I didn’t mean it the way it sounds. But I’ve been deathly afraid of Indians ever since we moved to Whipple Creek. About all the people talked about were the dread Apaches.” She gave a despondent sign. “And here I am their captive.” She drew a deep breath. “Burke took time to dig a grave for Dad. I did appreciate that. Burke let me have his horse, and we had just started out when we were surrounded.”

  He mentioned her use of the first name. “You’re fond of Hunter?”

  “At first. Because he came into my life at a time when I was desperate.” She shuddered. “I changed when I saw him kill three men—the last one even worse than the other two. He cut him horribly. Worst of all, he seemed to enjoy it.”

  “Lila, we’ve got to make plans.” He mentioned the Apache girl. “Can she help us?”

  “Moon Star wants to help. She has to be very careful. She’s going to try and get you a gun.”

  “Ahhh.” Sundance’s smile was fierce.

  “She speaks English, of course. She’s a bright girl and much too good to stay here for the rest of her days.”

  “Try and bring Moon Star here.”

  “I can’t leave until the squaws get through with me.” She looked him in the eye. “Moon Star says you’re quite famous. A Cheyenne Dog Soldier and ...” She broke off, reddening.

  “Killer,” he finished for her.

  She ignored it. “Can we get out?”

  He told her about making a break. An hour or so before dawn when the moon finally went down.

  “Thank God,” she said fervently. “I’d do anything rather than be a slave of that horrible Luke. And that’s what Moon Star says it amounts to.”

  “We’ll need luck, but we’ll make it.”

  Her smile was tremulous. “And if we escape, you won’t have to face up to morning. Some terrible test they plan for you ...” She broke off, as two plump squaws came around a wickiup, talking to each other, each carrying a filled bucket.

  “Bath water for me.” Lila shuddered. “Luke’s instructions for his bride to be, so I’ve been told.” She stood up.

  “They’ll humor Luke on the chance he might win. But he won’t.” He smiled. “By the time he gets here, we’ll be gone.”

  “You’d better leave now. If they see us talking together …”

  “I’ll be back in an hour.” He hurried away.

  He saw Hunter, the pale eyes gleaming, the arrogant smile pasted to the lips. “Even better than I thought. Big Luke will have help.” He laughed. “It’s no secret now. I can talk freely about the morning test.” Hunter bared his teeth. “Too bad I won’t be the one to kill you.”

  “When it’s time for your killing,” Sundance said angrily, “I’ll remember a Cheyenne boy, and how you cut him to pieces in Newton, Kansas.”

  Hunter’s look was blank. “Indian boy?” Then he remembered. “That kid. Well, I cut him so he’d always remember me.”

  “You son of a bitch!” Sundance cried.

  Hunter sprang for his throat, but Sundance caught him by the wrists. As they swayed, locked together, two guards came at a run, brandishing carbines.

  Not wishing to test their tempers or marksmanship, Sundance pushed Hunter away. He drew a deep breath, trying to get himself under control. The callous manner in which Hunter had referred to the Cheyenne youth had been too much.

  Hunter stared at him. “If we do meet tomorrow by some miracle,” he said, voice shaking, “I won’t get it over quickly as planned. If you think I cut that Cheyenne kid, it’s nothing to what I’ll do to you before I rip out your guts.”

  Walking away, Sundance brushed past Moon Star. She pretended to be knocked off balance. As she righted herself she swung close. “Your weapons are in El Tigre’s wickiup. I will try to get them.” Then she was gone. Sundance dared not show his sudden elation.

  He was summoned to an audience with El Tigre. The chief nodded to him, beckoned him closer and, surprisingly, laid an affectionate hand on his arm.

  Hovering at the chief’s back was the medicine man, his eyes in the dark, lined face bright with anticipation. He was bent over, supporting his weight on a stout stick.

  El Tigre mentioned the scars on Sundance’s chest. “You have been put to the test before, Sundance of the Cheyennes. And those scars mean you were initiated into the Dog Soldiers. And so you will be put to the test here.”

  “An hour after sunup, I understand.”

  “It is time for you to go to your wickiup and contemplate your strength and your cunning. Many Wolves tells me that you are great medicine. And if you are put to the supreme test and are victorious, it will benefit my people. You will not fail me. And tomorrow at noon, after you have killed Blood Knife, I will look upon you as my son.” El Tigre’s voice rose. “You and Sunflower will live with us for the rest of your days. You are the medicine that Many Wolves said was sure to come to me.” The voice trembled with emotion. “Your medicine and that of the sacred gold will mean that the pony soldiers will never again have power over us. We will sweep them and all the whites off our lands as a man tramples ants into the dust.”

  El Tigre turned his back and strode away; the audience was over.

  At the far end of the camp Sundance paused to watch braves teaching some young how to handle a bow and arrow. It brought back his own youth, when he had been the prize pupil of his grandfather, the chief.

  One of the teachers was no more than twenty, the age Sundance had been when he won his Cheyenne war bonnet.

  The young brave looked at Sundance out of bright eyes. “Many Wolves says that you can turn aside an arrow and even stop a bullet with the palm of the hand. And if this is so, you will be the greatest warrior among us.” In awe the small boys with their bows and arrows stared at Sundance.

  From a corner of his eye he saw Moon Star beckoning. He strolled away from the teachers and their pupils, then joined Moon Star in a narrow cleft between tall rocks where they were unseen by others.

  Moon Star tilted her head so that bright sunlight brought out the sheen of her black hair. “Sundance, your weapons are well-guarded.”

  “You’ll find a way,” he said urgently.

  “At the very least, I’ll get you a gun,” she promised.

  “Don’t take chances, Moon Star. I don’t want you to get into trouble.”

  “I will take risks because Lila should be returned to her own people.” She now spoke in Apache. “In some ways El Tigre is a fool to listen to Many Wolves. Some of the braves don’t like him, but he hopes to win them over completely by this show he has promised them; the Cheyenne Dog Soldier will be pitted against the brutal fists of Big Luke, and later he will fight a duel to the death with Blood Knife.”

  Sundance leaned close. “We leave tonight.”

  Her eyes glowed with approval. “Leave when the moon is down. There are not many braves in camp. It is your chance to get away before the others return with horses from Mexico. Scouts say they are on their way. But when they will arrive, I have no idea.”

  “When we make the break, you come with us.” She said it was not possible. She intended to marry a brave, Three Rivers. He was returning with the raiding party. Sundance accepted that. He had one more request. If possible, he wanted her to get her hands on Burke Hunter’s fighting knife.

  Her teeth flashed, sensing his motive. “Now I must go. Before I am missed.”

  Sundance felt a rising excitement. He glanced at the clear sky. It was only two hours past noon, plenty of time left for her to retrieve his weapons or show him how it could be done.

  As he was walking toward the cook fires he heard a sudden scuffing of moccasins at his back; men coming at a hard run. He started to turn, then felt his arms seized. An Apache on either arm. Although he hadn’t seen these two up close before, he knew they were the pair who had been with Black Moccasin.

  “Hold him, Crossed Arrows!” It was the Apache clinging to his right arm who shouted at his companion, flat-nosed and chunky. The one who had shouted was Two Trails, a brand of ownership on his forehead indicating that he had once been sold into slavery.

  As Sundance started to twist free, Black Moccasin struck him from behind, pushing hard with both hands, all three of the Apaches propelling him toward the nearest cook fire at a stumbling run. It was either run with them or lose his balance and fall face down.

  “Push his right hand in the cook pot!” Black Moccasin yelled.

  With a mighty roar, Sundance flung off Crossed Arrows. But Black Moccasin at his back struck him behind an ear with a clubbed fist. Half-stunned, Sundance broke stride. Black Moccasin thrust out a leg, tripping him. Sundance fell hard. He bounded to his feet and fought them with point of elbow, but their combined weight was too much to handle. As he struggled up, pulling them with him, he freed an arm and smashed a backhand just under the brand on the forehead of Two Trails. The Apache’s legs made a wishbone, then folded. But Black Moccasin and Crossed Arrows were both on his right arm, dragging him toward the pot boiling over the cook fire. Crossed Arrows, recovered from the backhand, began pushing him. Just as they were about to thrust his hand into the steaming liquid, Sundance, with sheer strength, flung them off. And at that moment he saw Big Luke in the crowd of Apaches now formed in a large circle. And Sundance knew the reasoning behind this treachery: Big Luke so determined to win Lila Corey and the sack of gold nuggets that he would go to any lengths.

  And El Tigre had evidently sanctioned it. It was a sneak attack intending to cripple him, to make him even more vulnerable to Big Luke’s mighty fists, to catch him off guard. El Tigre stood not a dozen yards away, arms folded. At his side the senile Many Wolves bent over his cane.

  In that instant Sundance’s head finally cleared from the clubbing he had received behind the ear and he shouted, “Cripple me, will you!”

  With his perfect balance he sent Crossed Arrows and Two Trails tumbling into the dust as Black Moccasin tried to seize him around the knees. Sundance cupped his two hands, caught Black Moccasin under the chin, and flipped him backward toward the fire. One of Black Moccasin’s feet kicked over the pot and its contents made a swath through the dust. Black Moccasin landed so close to the coals that the ends of his long black hair were singed.

  He yelped and rolled aside, beating out one flicker of flame near a shoulder. Crossed Arrows, in trying to get up, floundered in the pool of spilled food. It was a scene to evoke laughter, but the large circle of onlookers, braves, and the more numerous squaws and maidens were strangely silent, almost as if it might be a religious rite, instead of the treachery of three men against one.

  Chapter Nine

  BLACK MOCCASIN, HALF-STUNNED, on his knees, was rubbing at the singed ends of his hair. His gaze on Sundance was venomous. But the eyes also held a glint of triumph.

  It was all the warning Sundance needed. He was suddenly aware of grunts, of the sounds of a big man coming at full stride. Glancing over a shoulder, he saw Big Luke at a hard run, intending to ram him into the fire pit.

  Sundance started to run away from him and saw the look of disappointment on El Tigre’s face. But it was only to get away from the spilled food. In a cleared space where the footing was better, he suddenly whirled, bracing himself. There was a great smacking sound of flesh against flesh as their bodies collided. Such impact would have shattered the bones of lesser men. They broke apart, circling slowly, two gladiators attired in breech clout and leggings. Luke had smeared his heavy torso with grease to make it difficult to sustain a hand-hold. As they wrestled across the campground, the odor of rancid grease was strong in Sundance’s nostrils.

  “My woman, my gold,” Luke hissed as he tried to wrap his huge arms around the shorter Sundance’s waist.

  Sundance grappled with him, his hands slipping on the greasy flesh. “You don’t know the meaning of fighting fair,” Sundance flung at him as they swayed, locked together, in a circle.

  “El Tigre says you’re a spirit man,” Big Luke taunted in Cheyenne, laughing. “The more odds against you, the greater the medicine. But you’re only flesh and blood like the rest of us. When I beat you to death, then El Tigre will know which of us is the greater medicine.”

  From Sundance’s throat came the blood-chilling war cry of the Cheyenne as Big Luke’s arms tightened about his waist. Luke snorted in triumph; he believed the brawl was won hardly before it had started. His fingers locked against the spinal column; he began to bend Sundance back. Excitement danced in the eyes of the onlookers, as if they expected a quick finish, a snapped spine under the pressure of those powerful arms.

  For the benefit of the stoic Apaches, Sundance glared defiantly up at the broad, scarred face above him, showing utter contempt. And to punctuate it, he broke the hold; a sudden upthrust of arms tore Luke’s locked fingers apart.

  Still showing the same contempt, Sundance thrust the bigger man aside, danced back out of range of Luke’s giant fists swinging at his head. Luke pressed relentlessly, teeth bared.

  “You got away from me that time, Cheyenne!” Luke shouted. “Next time I’ll crack your spine like a stick!”

  In the midst of his raging threats Luke took a solid smash to the jaw. His body shuddered. In other savage encounters such a tremendous blow would have ended it. Luke’s legs, as if made of iron wood, somehow stiffened and propelled the body suddenly forward. Luke’s knuckles with the scarred tissue grazed Sundance’s chest instead of the jaw. No grizzly had ever exhibited more rage than Luke when the blow missed. And he did fight like a grizzly now, lashing out with both hands. Sundance spun away, chopped a right to the chin point, then followed with a left. But he suddenly chilled when he saw that Black Moccasin had recovered and was watching the battle from a few feet away, crouched on all fours in the position of a wild animal ready to spring.

  In trying to keep Luke’s ally always in sight, Sundance nearly became trapped again in the power vise of Luke’s arms. Sundance clawed at the forearms before they could lock in place, fingers slipping on the greasy skin. Luke tried again and succeeded.

  “I promised Hunter I’d have your brains in the dust, Cheyenne,” Big Luke snarled.

  In close, Sundance brought his forehead sharply down, hoping to smash the nose. All he got was the tip. But the blow to the sensitive spot brought a howl from Luke and a loosening of the terrible arms.

  Sundance tried to pull away. Luke rammed a thumb at an eye, but Sundance jerked aside in time. His hard right to Luke’s rib cage traveled only a few inches, but Luke’s jaw dropped, the eyes flooded with pain. Another smash to the ribs and Sundance was rewarded by Luke’s grunt of pain and surprise. Sundance ducked and weaved and struck again and again when the mighty fists missed their target. Another war whoop burst from Sundance; no Cheyenne in battle had ever sounded more confident. He was proving himself before El Tigre. A fight to the death, for sure, but Big Luke was already in trouble. Most men, upon witnessing such an historic contest, would have given vent to their feelings. But not a sound came from the watchers, as the two bronzed and sweated giants tried to batter each other into oblivion.

  Not a one of them, including their chief, seemed outraged when Black Moccasin decided it was time to give the faltering Luke a hand. He suddenly hurled himself at Sundance’s ankles. Sundance was toppled. As he was falling, he somersaulted across the hardpan, righted himself, momentum carrying him into a dead run. He twisted aside and spun back on Black Moccasin about to regain his feet. A startled look crossed the Apache face now on a level with Sundance’s lifted knee. At a hard run, Sundance drove it into the face of the rising Black Moccasin. Blood spurted from crushed lips. Sundance stumbled over the unconscious renegade, regained his balance, and whirled.

 

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