Pinner’s angry eyes raked around the perimeter and as the new men took up their positions he could see the sentry strength had been trebled. “Carry on,” he allowed, and led his horse toward the area in front of the stables where the men who had been to the rancheria were unsaddling their horses. He gave his mount into the care of a corporal and strode to the headquarters building. The window of the commanding officer’s office was squared with light. As he was about to enter, the door opened and the trooper who had sensed the full extent of the resentment lurking in the hearts and minds of the Borderline Apaches stepped out.

  When he had saluted and veered away, Pinner entered the office. It was as spartanly furnished as all other quarters in the remotely situated fort. A desk, three chairs, and a set of file drawers. On one wall hung a map of the Arizona Territory and another of the entire Department of New Mexico. A portrait of President Lincoln decorated another wall.

  The fat Captain Crane sat behind the desk pouring himself a drink from a bottle of French brandy. Pinner knew the bottle had been stolen from Major Anson several months previously. Crane had managed to lay the blame for the theft upon an unfortunate Apache who happened to be in the wrong place at the right time. The major had ordered the brave to be flogged. Pinner had carried out the sentence-tying the Indian to a wagon wheel, stripping him naked and then lashing him from calves to neck with a length of knotted rope. No skin had been broken, but the brave had suffered many hours of agony from the swollen and discolored bruises that covered his torso, buttocks, and legs. He had been left on display, bound to the wheel, for a full day.

  Crane and Pinner had enjoyed many small slugs of the fine liquor since then. But the captain’s fleshy face showed no sign of pleasure as he sucked from the glass now.

  “Something wrong?” Pinner asked.

  Crane fixed his second cousin with a pig-eyed stare. “You know Apaches better than me. You feel anything special out at Borderline tonight?”

  “Special?”

  “That trooper who just went out. Says he understands Indians better than most whites. Used to be a trapper here. Reckon we pushed them too far tonight. Reckons they’re about to turn hostile.”

  Pinner curled back his lips to show a scornful grin as Crane poured another slug of brandy and downed it at a gulp. “We made them mad, Silas,” he replied. “But they know they can’t do a thing about it. I’ve told you my theory about Indians often enough.”

  Crane nodded. “I know it. But that trooper seemed pretty certain he knew what he was talking about. So I’ve trebled the guard. You think I should send out a couple of men to scout the rancheria? Make sure the bastards stay where they’re meant to be?”

  Pinner shrugged. “Why not, Silas. If it makes you feel easier. You’re in command now. You can make the decision. What have you got to lose?”

  “Detail two men,” Crane said after a slight pause for thought. “But I don’t want contact made. Just to scout the rancheria and report to me on the situation there.”

  “Right,” Pinner responded, his green eyes roving over the blotchy face of Crane.

  The captain was drunk again. He had been unable to mount his horse unaided at the start of the ride to Borderline. He had sobered a little on the outward leg. The tension of the confrontation and the cold snap of night air on the return had accelerated the process. But the shots of brandy he had tossed against the back of his throat had quickly reactivated the stale alcohol polluting the blood flowing into his brain.

  “You’ll foin the wake, Silas?” Pinner asked.

  Crane glanced around the cold, impersonal office and shivered, not entirely from the chill air. The stark martialized nature of the design and furnishing seemed to epitomize the loneliness of a command for which Crane knew he was not competent. If there was to be Indian trouble, he had no desire to be alone. He took one more drink and replaced the bottle in a desk drawer as he stood up.

  “Think I’ll come to the funeral,” he said.

  Pinner concealed his amusement as he pulled open the door. He was well aware that the captain was so scared that even Dutch courage could not help him. Crane sensed his second-in-command recognized the scent of fear.

  “Be less than respectful if the commanding officer of Davidson wasn’t present,” he justified as he doused the lamp and stepped outside.

  A corporal and an enlisted man were just emerging from the stables, the last of the returning troopers to finish attending to their horses. Pinner ordered them to him and passed on Crane’s instructions to scout the rancheria. Both listened impassively to the orders, not daring to grimace their discontent until the lieutenant and captain had turned their backs, heading for the bridged exit from the fort.

  Inside the stable they cursed the officers and further vented their feelings by the tardiness with which they saddled fresh mounts. Not until they were outside in the compound again, swinging into their saddles and wheeling the horses toward the bridge, did they become conscious of a certain urgency about their mission. For they detected a subtle tension in the cold night air. This was most apparent in the strength of the sentries surrounding the fort’s buildings and the alert stance of each man at his position along the defensive ring. But it did not end here.

  The off-duty soldiers were quiet in the bunkhouses and a group of junior officers were clustered in front of their quarters, talking in low tones. Two sergeant gunners were taking shells from the arsenal and stacking them beside the four howitzers which guarded each approach to the store.

  Because they had spent such a long time in the stables, the men assigned to the scouting mission were the only soldiers in the fort who had not heard the prediction of Indian trouble. But the smell of fear and the knowledge that the only possible enemies were the Apaches urged the scouts to set aside their resentment toward their officers and heel the horses into a gallop once clear of the tiny street through the post.

  As the clatter of the horses’ hooves diminished into the distance, the plain pine casket containing the body of Armstrong Ford was lowered into the grave. Edward O’Regan, wizen-faced and pot-bellied, spoke the Lord’s Prayer as he and Nathan Ford played out the ropes supporting the box. Crane and Pinner looked on with complete lack of emotion. The lieutenant had found it necessary to remind the captain to remove his forage cap. The moment the prayer was completed and the dead man was in his. final resting place, the four mourners turned and headed into the saloon. The two dour-faced troopers assigned to the burial detail stepped forward and began to shovel the fresh-dug earth back into the pit. Knowing they had to be outside, the men were glad of the work. It helped to keep out the night’s cold, which had intensified with the springing up of a biting wind scything along the valley from the north.

  Warmth reached into every part of the crudely-furnished saloon from a stove at the center, which glowed red hot. But it was the sweat of fear, not over-heating, which oozed from the open pores in Chipeta’s flesh. She sat at one of the four tables spread around the stove, her delicately pretty face set in a mask of useless defiance. Jess Grainger sat across the table from her, with a glass of beer in one hand and a Colt revolver in the other. The big, blonde, and very unpretty Annie Colbert leaned provocatively against the front of the bar which extended along the rear wall of the saloon, jutting out her hip and thrusting forward her enormous breasts, half-exposed by the low neckline of her stained and patched, once fine, flame-red gown. She was taking small sips from a shot glass, her small blue eyes regarding the squaw’s beauty with envy. John Hedges sat at a table on the other side of the stove from Chipeta and Grainger, nursing the sleeping baby on his knee. It had not been easy to get the squaw to surrender her child, but Hedges had spoken to her persuasively in her own tongue and she had surfaced from her shock to recognize the schoolteacher as the tutor of Cuchillo and a friend to all Apaches. She had seen the gentleness with which Hedges handled the child and been convinced of his good intentions when she saw the way he rocked him back into his disturbed sleep.

  “You were told Annie was to have the brat!” Pinner snarled from the doorway as the four mourners burst in through the bat-wings, anxious to escape the freshening cold of the night.

  “Come on, folks,” O’Regan said as he hurried to the end of the bar and went through the flap, anxious to set the drinks flowing and the money into his cash drawer. “Like always at my wakes, the first round’s on the house.”

  Ford was the first one to belly up to the bar, eager to drown his genuine sorrow at the loss of an only son—and to calm his jumping nerves, agitated by fear of the consequences his false accusation threatened to unleash. For he had sensed Crane’s fear and seen the activity at the fort.

  As Crane hooked a heel over the bar rail, the grinning O’Regan slammed down a half dozen shot glasses and upended a bottle of whiskey over them.

  “I wouldn’t soil my hands on an Injun brat!” Annie Colbert growled as she slid her empty glass along the bar.

  O’Regan filled it and slid it back.

  Pinner stood over Hedges, glowering down at him. Chipeta made to rise, but halted the move when Grainger banged the butt of the Colt against the table top. The men at the bar downed their free drinks, then dug into their pockets and slapped coins and bills onto the counter top.

  “Grainger’s calling the tune, Lieutenant,” Crane said without turning around, as he watched O’Regan pour fresh drinks and extract payment from the piles of money.

  Pinner’s expression became challenging as he swung to face the grinning Indian Bureau agent. Grainger had a hawk face and a lean body. At first glance, his liquid brown eyes had a personable look and he had the kind of mouth which smiled easily. But all that knew him were well aware of the mean streak which ran through him, likely to rise to the surface at any time, especially when he had poured a great deal of beer down his scrawny throat. Now, his mouth held the smile, but his eyes turned from liquid to ice.

  “Annie and me are good friends,” he said softly. “I wouldn’t want her to do anything she didn’t like.”

  “Unless you paid me,” the whore muttered acidly.

  “Come and take a damn drink!” Crane called.

  Pinner swung angrily away from the table and strode to the bar. Hedges gave Chipeta a reassuring nod, then became aware that Grainger had swung the revolver to cover him.

  “Tell the squaw to fetch me a beer, nursemaid,” he rasped.

  Hedges tried to swallow his fear as he held the agent’s level, demanding gaze. He opened his mouth to protest, but Grainger spoke first, altering the aim of the gun.

  “Before you say anything,” he warned, “this revolver’s got a sensitive trigger. Just need to have a little accidental jolt of my hand. Bang! Another funeral. Small box. Apache kid. Named Hole-in-the-Head. Maybe No-Head.”

  The agent’s matter-of-fact tone added validity to the threat.

  “He wants you to get him a drink,” Hedges said to Chipeta in Apache. “He says he’ll kill your baby if you don’t obey.”

  The pretty young squaw did not hesitate. She had seen the gun pointing at the sleeping child and the transformation of Hedges’ expression into the twisted lines of horror. She stood up stiffly and walked to the bar with her shoulders slumped and head bowed. The plain calfskin dress molded the lines of her body and its hem caressed her bare legs. The men at the bar turned to watch her with a mixture of scorn and lust.

  “You gotta pay for new drinks, Jess,” O’Regan reminded.

  “Oh yeah,” the agent responded, digging into his pocket and bringing out a fistful of bills.

  The saloon owner directed Chipeta’s attention toward Grainger and the agent crooked a finger at the woman. She returned to the table and he stood. The fingers of his gun hand clawed over the neckline of her dress and the muzzle of the Colt forced her chin up. His shining eyes locked with the woman’s dull ones as he plunged a hand inside her dress and dropped the money into the warm valley of her unfettered breasts. His fingers made exploratory probes before he withdrew the hand. Chipeta stood woodenly before him, forced to submit to his intimate touch.

  “Don’t hog it all to yourself, Grainger!” Crane slurred, gathering up his money and staggering to a table.

  The agent used the barrel of the Colt to turn her head so that the squaw looked toward the outstretched hand of the captain. There was more movement and her eyes roved the room as Pinner and Ford crossed to sit down, holding up handfuls of money. The whore looked at the squaw with spiteful eyes. O’Regan trembled in anticipation of retrieving the money.

  “You understand why I must do this thing?” Chipeta said dully to John Hedges.

  He nodded, pathetic in his impotence. “And you know I cannot help you. Just try to keep your baby safe.”

  “Thank you,” Chipeta replied, and moved from table to table, submitting to the humiliation with stoic calm.

  Her dress was held in at her narrow waist by a belt of plaited hair. The bodice swelled and became heavy with bills and coins. At the bar, the slavering O’Regan delved a filthy hand into the neck of the dress and withdrew a single bill after much exploring of the firm, sweat-sticky flesh.

  “Reckon I’ll just take payment when it comes due,” he said with a high-pitched giggle. “She’s got the kind of bank I like to visit a lot.”

  Hedges knew the men would not confine the humiliation of Chipeta to this level, and knew just as surely that he was powerless to help her. All he could do was sit and watch as the squaw moved back and forth between bar and tables, delivering drinks to the customers and allowing O’Regan to root inside her dress for the money to pay for them. The men became drunker and Annie Colbert’s eyes grew heavier with spiteful envy. But throughout, Pinner – who was the youngest and fittest man present –stayed less noisily inebriated than the rest. He made it plain that he knew of Hedges’ wish to help the Indian woman and spent more time watching the schoolteacher than in lusting after the squaw. His holster was unbuttoned and whenever Hedges spotted the careful surveillance, the lieutenant dropped his palm over the Colt butt.

  The orgiastic wake had been in progress for almost ninety minutes, during which time it had been necessary to replenish the money inside Chipeta’s dress on three occasions, when the drunken whore dropped the reins on her temper. For too long, she had been the only woman in the midst of more than a hundred men, such an imbalance of the sexes completely negating her ugliness and overweight. It was, perhaps, natural that she should view the introduction of the squaw as an unacceptable intrusion into her exclusive domain—irrespective of Chipeta’s unwillingness to do the men’s bidding.

  But to Annie, the reasoning did not matter. Her anger flared into the open and her attack was impulsive. Chipeta was just turning away from the bar with a brimming glass of whiskey in each hand. She was near exhaustion from the fear and the strain of stemming her emotions. The stink of sweat and spilled liquor was fogging her mind and her eyes stung with the acrid blue of cheroot smoke. She was unaware of any movement behind her.

  The whore hooked a big foot around the squaw’s ankles and gave her a violent shove in the small of her back. Chipeta emitted a cry of alarm and pitched forward to the sawdust-spread floor, both glasses flying from her hands. Liquor hissed and vaporized on the glowing stove. With a yell of triumph, Annie Colbert launched her considerable weight on to the prone slimness of the squaw.

  Hedges started to rise, then froze. Pinner had leaned forward, drawing his Colt, and thrust the muzzle against the nape of the schoolteacher’s neck.

  “If nursing babies is men’s work, fighting must be women’s,” the lieutenant whispered with low venom.

  Chipeta’s instinct was to struggle against the enormous weight of her attacker and fight back at the blows pummeled over her head and back. But the horrifying thought that her baby would be harmed because of her retaliation urged her to submit limply to the beating. She lay utterly inert, unable to breathe because of the great weight bearing down upon her and struggling against the need to cry at the pain that each powerfully delivered punch jarred through her.

  Grainger, O’Regan and Crane leaned forward, waving aside the clouds of tobacco smoke, their stinking breath coming in short gasps of excitement as they peered at the one-sided fight. But, because of the squaw’s refusal to defend herself, the novelty was short-lived. Even the sight of the whore’s pendulous breasts, shaken free of her dress by the exertion, failed to hold the men’s interest for long. But it triggered an idea in Grainger’s alcohol-addled brain.

  “Strip her, Annie!” he yelled. “We’ve all had the feeling. Let’s see what kind of assets we invested our money in. Strip the bitch!”

  The whore, her anger intensified by Chipeta’s meek acceptance of the violence, did not hear the first words the agent yelled at her. For her rage had set up a roaring in her ears which drove all other sounds into the far distance of another, saner world. But the final command penetrated her writhing brain and she accepted it as the opportunity to vent her spite in a more satisfying way than beating against apparently unfeeling flesh.

  Her fleshy fists unfolded and her dirt-grimed fingers clawed at the top of the squaw’s dress beneath the long, jet-black hair. But the tough calfskin refused to tear under the power of her enraged strength. She cursed and reached down a hand to hoist up her dress. The hemline rose to expose a flabby, vein-bulged thigh. A knife sheath was held against the scaled flesh by a leather thong. With the smoothness of an expert, she drew the short-bladed dagger and hooked it under the top of Chipeta’s dress.

  “No cutting!” It was Crane who shouted the warning. Despite the vast quantities of cheap whiskey he had poured down his throat, there was still a tiny knot of dread which refused to be loosed from the back of his mind. From it he drew the warning that he would be safer with a ravished squaw than a wounded one. Lust blocked the logic of this. The tawny flesh of Chipeta’s naked back expanded the lust and swamped the dread.

  The whore took heed of the warning as she drew the dagger downward, raising herself from the prone squaw and rocking back on to her heels. The finely honed blade slit easily through the soft leather of the dress, the chemise, and breeches. She leaned forward and flicked each side of the tattered garments away from the inert body, exposing the vibrant young flesh from shoulders to heels.

 

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