Feud On The Mesa

breathing hard. He faced his councilors and launched forth into a violent harangue, in Apache, spitting and snarling words from his chest in a gurgling staccato of anger.

No Salt and two elders, who apparently didn’t un-derstand English, grunted and cast baleful glances at Doom. The unpainted man with the low forehead was smiling in a triumphant, lazy way. When Red Sleeves had stopped his tirade, this man’s voice, soft and clear, came into the conversation in perfect English. Caleb was startled. “Your memory is poor, Caleb Doom. You don’t recall El Lobo, the Taos Comanchero.”

The swarthy face was smiling expectantly. Doom recognized him then. Sam Ginn, one of that reckless, unscrupulous brotherhood of white and mixed-blood traders who were called Comancheros, or roaming traders. Some were honest, fearless men, but most were men who took the big gamble for a quick and rich profit. Of these latter, Sam Ginn was known as a half-breed Comanche, from the Mexican terri-tory that became Texas a little later. Here was a shrewd trader, waxing rich and safe where other, more decent men were leaving their bones to bleach under the savage, hot sun of the untamed land. Caleb had met Ginn before; he had ordered him off the base at Santa Fe several times. There was no re-spect or friendship here.

He inclined his head softly, a pensive, accusing light in his deep-set, gray eyes. “Sam, I thought it must be something like this. I figured someone must have stirred them up…someone who had an ability to organize and profiteer.”

Ginn shrugged indifferently, the cool smile still on his heavy face. “I don’t profiteer. Sell them a little powder, a few cases of contraband whiskey and bullets, trade for horses and jewelry of the whites they kill.” His shoulders rose and fell agreeably, leisurely. “Better I get it than it rot on the desert. Good business, Doom, that’s all. Good business.”

Doom motioned toward the Apache n’deh b’keh moccasins, the breechclout, and the scalping knife. “Playin’ Indian, Sam, so’s you won’t be caught by the soldiers and shot for a renegade?”

“Seguro. That’s good business, too, ain’t it?” Ginn asked.

Doom turned to Red Sleeves, who was listening to the conversation. “You are making a mistake by letting this man talk up a war. He is a renegade. The Apaches do not like traitors any more than the whites do. This man.…”

Red Sleeves slashed the air with an impatient arm. “He is advisor to the Apaches. He brings us the things we need.” He shrugged indifferently. “He is well paid, but, as he has said, the trinkets we pay him with are of little value to us. It is a good trade.”

“Red Sleeves, you are bringing down fire and the sword on your own people. This man has talked you into a great wrong.”

“I don’t want to hear any more, Silent Outcast.”

Sam Ginn turned languidly to the chief. “Let’s take him on the raid with us tonight. It would be well if his corpse was found among the dead whites at Clearwater Springs.” The smile was full of hate now and the small, bird-like black eyes were cruel pools of resentment. “We would have the last laugh. The white soldiers would find him left behind by the Apaches and would think he was, indeed, a renegade…like they said he was when they drummed him out of their army at Santa Fe.”

For a long, brooding moment Red Sleeves thought over Ginn’s plan. He respected the fighting ojo claro before him, but this was a war to extinction and the great white fighters were no better than the lesser ones. In fact, it would be well to kill the great ones first, then the Indians would have nothing but pale-faced human sheep to slaughter.

Red Sleeves nodded slowly, looking straight into Caleb’s eyes. “Yes, we will take him with us and leave his body among the dead. But the Apaches shall kill him, for he is a brave warrior and no stain must linger after the death of great fighting men.” He turned to No Salt: “Guard him well, No Salt, until we are ready to ride.”

III

No Salt was a good guardian. The day was al-most spent and he took his prisoner over to his own camp to eat. The meal was a dolorous, silent affair with Free Man eating desultorily, No Salt chewing in carefully averted grimness, and No Salt’s squaw impassive and dour. Caleb Doom ate hungrily. The food wasn’t tasty, and Doom knew better than to ask what it was. It was the first meal since he had left Leclerc at Denton. His mind was busy, too. The Apaches had not disarmed him and he resolved, once in the neighborhood, to fire his gun and let the settlers at Clearwater Springs know that trouble was coming. That he’d die, he under-stood, but he was to die anyway.

No Salt wiped his hands painstakingly on the uppers of his moccasins. “You are to leave your gun and knife with me.”

Doom felt his hopes tumble. He considered immediate resistance but decided against it. Free Man had interpreted again and was watching the frontiersman owlishly Doom spoke as he unbuckled the wide, mahogany- colored belt and let his .44 and scalping knife drop gently against the warm earth. “One more gun and knife to hasten the fall of my brothers.”

Free Man bristled. “It is not so.”

“Yes, the result of warfare is warfare. The Apaches have been my brothers, and I hate to see them used,” Doom said angrily.

“No one uses the Apaches.”

“Not even Sam Ginn?”

“No. Sam Ginn is a’breed Comanche. He is like one of us, his race fights the ojos claws, too,” Free Man answered.

Caleb nodded thoughtfully as he watched the shadows lengthen. “Yes, one half of him fights the ojos claws, while the other half profits from the fighting. It is a good combination, for a trader.”

No Salt requested an interpretation, listened with downcast eyes and furrowed brow as Free Man told him what Caleb had said, looked oddly at the frontiersman, and arose, growling an order that was quickly made plain to Doom. The time had come to ride.

A raucous turmoil boiled through the large Indian encampment as the warriors, uniformly short, bandy- legged, and heavy-shouldered, painted and decorated in lurid symbols of death and ruin, assembled on their horses. They were awaiting the arrival of their war leaders, Red Sleeves and a dry-eyed, fanatically featured younger man called Antonio—a kidnapped Navajo who had grown up as an Apache.

Caleb looked over the fighting bucks. He estimated their number at 400—more Apaches than he had ever seen in a fighting party before.

Red Sleeves rode up beside him and inclined his head respectfully, broodingly “There are fool Apaches just as there are fools among the ojos claws. The Apache fools would have you die in disgrace.” He shook his head firmly. “This will not happen, Silent Outcast. The older warriors know you are a great fighting man. They will see that you die as one. There shall be no shame to follow your spirit.”

Caleb nodded gravely, his face a blank painting. The Indian turned his horse, cast a careful eye over the gathered multitude of fighters, delayed the departure for a dramatic moment while all eyes were upon him, looked briefly heavenward, then nodded. The quiet of a moment before was broken by shrill shrieks from the children and women, the deep-chested, savage screams of the eager marauders, and the spiteful cries of the older men who had to remain behind. The grass was churned under 1,600 unshod hoofs, and a strong smell of animal and human sweat followed the disturbed atmosphere as the hostile bucks rode gracefully away from their rancheria without a backward glance. They talked and gesticu-lated among themselves, already forgetting home and families, to brag about the things they would do when they came to Clearwater Springs.

The darkness came down swiftly and with it a thick sickle of a moon that cast an eerie, ghostly light over the great sweep of the broad landscape. Sage, pungent with the yellow flowers blooming profusely in the late spring, and thorny chaparral, gray-green in the watery light, were a fitting, weird backdrop for the wild throng of horsemen who rode briskly toward their objective.

Caleb let his mind wander back to previous visits to Clearwater Springs. He fixed the location of the log and