He had seen men killed in battle because fear and dread caused them to lose control of their stomachs or their bowels. In the time of battle a fighting man needed to stay empty, in his view; there would be time enough for feasting once the battle had been fought.
Still, he was human, and could not be fully immune to the smell of cooking meat. Then he saw movement to the west. In a moment a coyote came in sight, its ears pricked up, going toward the ridges to the south. The coyote was moving purposely; perhaps it smelled the cooking meat too. Perhaps, after all, it was a not a dream smell that had brought him awake in the Yellow Canyon.
Scull decided he might as well follow the coyote--it had a better nose than he did and would lead him to the meat, if there was meat.
He walked for two hours, keeping the coyote just in sight. For long stretches he lost the meat smell entirely, but then, faintly, if the wind shifted to the south, he would smell it again. Between one gray ridge and the next he lost the coyote completely. The country rose slightly; he was crossing a mesa, or tableland, almost bare of vegetation.
From being intermittent, the smell became constant, so constant that Scull could say with conviction that it was not a deer or a pig that was being cooked: it was a horse. He had eaten horse often in his trekking in the West and didn't think he could be mistaken. Somewhere nearby horsemeat was cooking--but why would the smell carry nearly a dozen miles, to the canyon where he had slept?
Then Scull began to notice tracks, many tracks. He was crossing the route of a considerable migration--there were a few horse tracks, but most of the migrating people were on foot. Some were barefoot, some wore moccasins. There were even dog tracks --x was as if a village had decided to move itself across the empty tableland.
Then Scull saw the smoke, which seemed to be rising out of the ground, a mile or more ahead. The smoke rose as if from a hidden fire. He didn't know what to make of it, but he did know that he had begun to feel exposed. He was in plain sight on a bare mesa where a hundred people or more had just passed. Scull looked around quickly, hoping for a ridge, a hump of dirt, or patch of sage--anything that could conceal him, even a hole he could hide in until darkness fell, but there was nothing. Besides, he was marching in stout boots and his tread would stand out like a road sign to anyone with an eye for tracks.
Scull turned and hurried back toward the last cover, doing his best to erase or at least blur his track as he went. Suddenly he felt more exposed than he ever had, in all his years of soldiering; a kind of panic seized him, an overwhelming need to hide until dark came. Then he could come back and unravel the mystery of the smoke and the smell of cooking meat.
Scull hurried back, scrubbing out his tracks as best he could, as he walked--the last ridge had been rocky; he felt sure he could dig under one of them and stay safely hid until dark.
Then he saw the old man, coming toward him along his own track. The minute he saw him he remembered something Famous Shoes had said.
'Ahumado is always behind you,' Famous Shoes had told him. 'Don't look for him in front.
When he wants you he will appear, and he will be behind you.' The memory came too late. The Black Vaquero was following the plain track left by his boots. The old man seemed to be alone, but Scull knew his men had to be somewhere nearby.
The old man had not lived to a great age by being a fool.
Scull decided he would just keep walking, with his head down, pretending he hadn't seen Ahumado, until he was in rifle range.
He shot best from a prone position. When the distance was narrowed sufficiently he would just drop to the ground and fire. With one well-placed shot he could eliminate the Black Vaquero, the old bandit who had harassed the settlers of the border as ferociously as Buffalo Hump had the settlers along the northern rivers.
Of course, the pistoleros would probably run him down and kill him, but then it was not the Scull way to die at home. His brother had been yanked off a whaling ship in the Hebrides and drowned. His Uncle Fortescue had drunk poisoned kvass in Circassia, and his father had been attempting to ice-skate on the frozen Minnesota River when he was overwhelmed by a band of Cree Indians. The Sculls died vividly, but never at home.
Scull had only a hundred yards to walk before he was in rifle range of Ahumado. He didn't mean to risk a long shot, either. The one hundred yards might take him three minutes; then he would have to decide between certain martyrdom and very uncertain diplomacy. If he chose to risk the diplomacy he would have to live until Ahumado chose to let him die, which might be after days of torture. It was a choice his forebears had not had to make. His brother hadn't meant to get jerked out of the whaleboat, his Uncle Fortescue had no idea the kvass was poisoned, and his father had merely been skating when the Cree hacked him down.
Scull walked on; Ahumado came in range; Scull didn't shoot.
Too curious about that smoke, he told himself.
Maybe he'll consider me such a fine catch that he'll ask me to dinner.
Then he saw, to Ahumado's right, four small dark men. To his left a tall man on a paint horse had appeared. The Black Vaquero, indeed, had not been alone.
For a moment, Scull wavered. Only six men opposed him. Ahumado carried no weapon--the only gunman was the skinny man on the paint horse; he could shoot him, grab the horse, and run. His fighting spirit rose. He was about to level his rifle when he glanced over his shoulder and saw, to his amazement, that four more of the dark men were just behind him, within thirty yards. They had risen as if from the earth and they carried bolos, the short rawhide thongs with rocks at each end that Mexicans threw at the legs of cattle or deer, to entwine them and bring them down.
Scull did not level his rifle; he knew he had waited too long. Now it would have to be diplomacy. The fact that the dark men had simply appeared was disturbing. He had looked the terrain over carefully and seen no one; but there they were and the die was cast.
Ahumado came to within ten feet of Scull before he stopped.
'Well, hello from Harvard,' Scull said.
'I'm Captain Scull.' 'You have come just in time, Captain,' the old man said.
