Maria didn't want it to be soon.
Call had a sense that someone was behind him, but if so, it was someone smart. After two days, the sense was so strong that Call doubled back twice. If it was the Garza boy, Call might surprise him. Even if he didn't surprise him, he could probably strike his track and determine whether the boy was alone.
In the course of four days' travel, he doubled back three more times, but he didn't surprise Joey Garza, and he struck no track.
Yet, the sense that someone was behind him wouldn't leave him. It became a conviction, though none of his maneuvers produced the slightest evidence of a pursuer. Anyone following him would have had to be on horseback, and horses left tracks. But there were no tracks. If it was the Garza boy, then he was a formidable plainsman.
In the cold night, Call rode a circle, hoping to glimpse a campfire, but there was no campfire, either.
It was vexing, because it made him distrust his own instincts. Maybe he had slipped a notch, as a tracker; or maybe he had just begun to imagine things. Never before had he followed his instincts and come up totally empty.
All he could do was travel cautiously. At night, he made no fires; he slept little, and kept his horse saddled and the bridle reins in his hand when he lay down. During the day, he kept as much space around him as possible. He tried to stay a mile or more from any cover that might shelter a killer with a fine rifle and a telescope sight. He whirled his horse often, hoping to catch a flash of reflection on a spur or a bridle bit, but he saw no reflections.
He was alone; yet, he knew he wasn't.
Then it occurred to him that perhaps the boy wasn't on horseback. Perhaps he was a runner, like Famous Shoes, or some of the celebrated Apaches. If so, he was bold indeed. Few men of experience would voluntarily put themselves afoot in such country, in the wintertime. Few would be able to do without fire to rest by, in the freezing night.
Call's own hands ached terribly, in the mornings. Three days passed without his even unsaddling his horse. He was afraid he might not be able to pull the saddle straps tight again, with his sore hands. When the horse grazed, he walked with him. One night, he napped on his feet, leaning against the horse for warmth. He took the trigger guards off both rifles; his knuckles were too swollen to fit through them.
On the fifth day, he crossed the trail of Mox Mox and his men. They were traveling toward Fort Stockton. The trail was fresh--the gang had just passed. In fact, to the northwest, Call did see a flash, as the sun struck some piece of equipment.
Call checked the loads in both rifles and took his extra Colt out of the saddlebags. It was midafternoon. He turned northwest, on the easily followed track of the killers. He put his horse into a lope, debating with himself about the timing of his ambush.
He could try to overtake them that day; his mount was fresh enough. If he could kill Mox Mox and the Cherokee, the others might run. But he needed good light to shoot by, and he also needed to be close. He was not shooting a German rifle with a telescope sight. He was confident of his marksmanship, but only if the range and the light were favorable. If he attacked at night, as Gus had once attacked Blue Duck's camp, it would all be guesswork, and anyhow, he had never been as reckless on the attack as Gus McCrae.
Within an hour, it became apparent that catching up with the gang would be no trouble. They were idling along. Call soon had to drop back and veer west of them to lessen the danger of being observed.
He decided then to try to close the gap and hit them as they made camp. They didn't know he was following them, and might not immediately set a guard.
The outlaws were even lazier than Call judged them to be, at first. It was only a little past midafternoon when they made camp. Call walked his horse for the last three miles, as he approached. He was one against eight, and he wanted to be as meticulous as possible in what he had to do.
He could not expect to thunder in and kill eight men, or even cripple them sufficiently to remove them as a threat. Above all, he had to try to kill the fighter, Jimmy Cumsa, first.
As Call cautiously moved, foot by foot, to within two hundred yards of the camp, he heard a child scream. It was a rude surprise--Mox Mox must have taken a child from some farm or ranch, in his marauding. The outlaws had not even made a campfire yet; surely they couldn't be burning the child.
But the child continued to scream, as Call crept closer. The child's screams rang in Call's ears, echoing other screams, heard years before.
On one of his first forays against hostile Indians, when he was a young Ranger, the troop had surprised a little cluster of Comanche, on the Washita. They recovered two young white captives, both girls. Just before the Rangers raced down on the camp, one of the little girls screamed. An old Comanche woman was beating her with a stick. Call shot the old woman, the only female he ever killed in his years of battle. The little girls had lost their minds, from the cold and the beatings. The one the old woman was beating recovered and married; the other one was never right.
When Call got close enough to look over a low ridge, down into the camp where the child was screaming, he saw that Mox Mox had two children, a boy and a girl. They were bound together by a short length of chain. Mox Mox was quirting the boy savagely, whipping him in the face. The little girl seemed too terrified to even whimper, but the boy screamed every time the quirt struck him.
Call looked first for Jimmy Cumsa, but saw at once that he had no clean shot at him--the Cherokee was among the horses, preparing to hobble them for the night. The three Mexicans, the giant, and a small man were standing idle, easy targets. But the giant was standing between Call and Mox Mox, watching him quirt the child. The eighth man Call couldn't immediately see, which worried him.
Call had never seen a man beat a child so savagely. What the old Comanche woman on the Washita had done to the young girl was merely rough, compared to the whipping he was witnessing. Call felt he had to act quickly; otherwise, Mox Mox might whip the boy's eyes out, or even kill him with the quirt. There was no time to plan; he had to shoot, if he wanted to save the child's eyesight and possibly his life. He could not shoot the Cherokee first, or the manburner, either. He had to act, if he hoped to save the little boy's vision.
Call shot the giant man first, hoping he would fall clear and give him a clean shot at Mox Mox. But the giant staggered, leaving Mox Mox mostly hidden. Calf went ahead, risked one shot and hit him, but Mox Mox did not fall.
Even before he could lever a third shot, he heard horses racing away and knew that Jimmy Cumsa was
