Plummer.
“George Ives, I recognize. Them three I don’t know.” He pointed to the Butrum brothers. “But if they are like the other men you have riding with you, then you ain’t got much.”
“Sorry you don’t like the quality of my help,” Plummer replied. “But then, you don’t have to like them. All you have to do is pay taxes.”
Kris glanced over at his rifle. It was lying against a rock, about thirty feet away. There was no way he could get to it in time, and, even if he could, it wouldn’t do him any good. It was charged with only one shot, and there were six men facing him.
He sighed in defeat. “How much,” he asked, reaching down into his sack.
“All of it,” Plummer replied innocently.
“What? All of it? Are you crazy?”
“No,” Plummer said. “I’m not crazy. I’m maybe just a little greedy. But I’m not crazy.” He laughed, maniacally, then pulled the trigger, shooting Kris Dumey down in cold blood.
“One of you boys get the sack,” he said. “We’ll divide up the gold later.”
Angus Butrum climbed down from his horse, took the sack from Dumey’s dead fingers, then remounted.
“Take a look inside,” Plummer ordered.
Angus stuck his hand down into the sack and pulled out a couple of rocks. Both rocks glittered with gold.
“Damn!” Angus said. “There’s a fortune in this sack.”
George Ives laughed. “I told you this was a sweet deal,” he said. “Have you ever heard the term ‘license to steal’? Well, my friend, that’s what we’ve got. A license to steal.”
Chapter Fifteen
As soon as he saw Revelation, James knew there was something wrong. Her wagon was about a mile ahead, sitting absolutely motionless. Slapping his legs against the side of his horse, he urged the animal into a gallop, covering the mile in just under three minutes.
When he reached the wagon, Revelation was sitting quietly in her seat, holding the reins in her hands, staring straight ahead.
“Revelation, what is it?” James asked. “Why have you stopped?”
Revelation looked over at James. There was an expression of shock and horror in her face.
“What is it?” James asked.
Without answering him, Revelation pointed with a shaking hand.
Though it had been hidden by a small rise as James approached the wagon, now he could see what had stopped Revelation in her tracks. There, just below the rise and not more than fifty yards away, was a burned-out wagon. But it wasn’t the wagon that was holding her attention. It was what was lying on the ground alongside the wagon. There, naked and ghastly white, were three bodies. Each body was pierced by dozens of arrows, and from their scalped and broken heads, spilled brains lay in the dirt, cooked by the sun.
“Stay there,” James said, swinging down from his horse.
“Don’t worry,” Revelation replied in a tight voice. “I’m not going anywhere.”
James walked over for a closer look. It was a man and two women, though one of the women looked very young, perhaps in her teens. It was difficult to be certain, because the sun was already beginning to have its effect. At first, James thought the Indians had taken everything. Then he saw a small journal lying nearby, its leaves fluttering in the breeze.
James picked it up and began reading.
“What is it?” Revelation called. Though she hadn’t come any closer, she had climbed down and was now standing alongside the wagon.
James walked back over to the wagon and showed Revelation the journal. She looked at it for a moment, then looked back toward the three bodies. Tears were streaking down her cheeks.
For the first time since leaving Bexar County, James saw a soft and vulnerable side to Revelation. He wasn’t sure what made him do it, but he reached out to her, put his arms around her, and pulled her to him. She began to cry and he stood there for a long moment, not speaking, just holding her.
Finally Revelation was all cried out, and she pulled herself away from him then ran her hand through her hair, as if composing herself.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s just such a sad thing to see. A family like that, excited by the future. Then, to have that future taken from them in such a horrible way.”
“I know.”
“What do we do now?” Revelation asked.
“I’m going to bury them,” James said, removing a shovel from its straps on the side of the wagon. “Then we’ll wait here for the others to catch up.”
“What if the Indians are still here?”
James looked all around the area. “If they were still here, they would have shown themselves by now. I’d say that, for the present at least, we are safe.”
“For the present,” Revelation said.
“Yes.”
“And what happens after the present?”
“We’ll just have to cross that bridge when we come to it,” James answered. He took the shovel back over to where the three bodies lay, covered by a swarm of flies. They were already a little ripe, so he moved upwind from them, then began to dig.
He was just patting down the dirt over the last grave when the others arrived. Seeing Revelation, James, and the burned-out wagon, Bob darted ahead of the herd, then rode quickly up.
“What is it? What happened here?”
“A man, woman, and their daughter were killed here,” James explained. “I just buried them.”
“Indians?”
“Yes.”
“You think it was just a few renegades? Or are they on the warpath?”
“I don’t know if they are on the warpath,” James answered. “But from the number of arrows sticking out of everyone’s body, I’d say that what was done here was done by more than just a few renegades.”
By now Duke and Billy had joined them.
“A family, killed by Indians,” Bob said, answering their unasked questions.
“So what do we do now? I mean, you aren’t planning on turning back or anything like that, are you?” Bob asked.
“No way. We’ve come this far, we’re going the rest of the way. But we are going to have to be a little more careful.”
“Careful how?”
“Well, for one thing, I don’t plan to send Revelation ahead of us anymore,” James said. “I think it will be safer for her if she stays back with us. Also, we had better keep our eyes peeled from now on. We may run across Indians, but I don’t plan to be surprised by them.”
Although it was more efficient for Revelation to travel ahead of the herd, set up camp, and have supper ready by the time the others arrived, she began traveling with the group. James’s idea of having her stay back so she could travel with the rest of them made her feel a lot safer. Most agreed with James that this was the best thing to do, but the agreement wasn’t unanimous. Matthew had argued against it yesterday, when James made the
